Science and Religion Message Board 501-1000

I remember a similar field theory based on the discovery of "govons." It was noted that govons are amoung the densest particles yet discovered...

Evil is not a physical principal. Evil is purely "spiritual." Whether the parable of Genisis is taken literaly or in alegory; The lesson remains: Devining the difference between good and evil is an aquired trait.

Good and evil can be viewed as both relative and absolute values. Absolute in the sense that they are processes of change, not adjetives of value; relative in the sense that events have no absolute meaning untill considered in the context of the events preceeding and proceeding from them.

"The man died when the bullet passed through his temple." -- good or evil? You can not judge because it is without context.

Divorced of spirituality the terms good and evil have no meaning. The only meaning is probability. Even adding life to the mix will only bring out survival. Good and evil must wait for intelligence, need and spiritual awareness.

Note: A beliefe in a "God" is helpfull, but not required for spiritual awareness.

I also have trouble following on weekends and nights, but if I'm tied to the 'pooter all day doing research, I like to check in regularly. I think we've got a jim dandy discussion going here on a number of fascinating levels, so I've got to try and keep my own tangents to a minimum... which is not too easy.

We're still skirting the edges of absolute and relative here, just exploring some of the tangents related both ways first to get a feel for where we are coming from. Join right in!

Thanks. Since joining this board, I've learned a great deal and been introduced to a few concepts I hadn't really considered before. Much food for thought.

Keith also noted that:

though I would probably substitute another word for spirituality, as once again, that is a very subjective word. Perhaps context and/or intent, instead.

I thank you Keith for your response to my question about the nature of Evil. I believe you are right about the lesson of Genesis, that it lays out a psychological/spiritual imperitive to know the difference between good and evil, or between absolute and relative (another level of the same divination process).

The basic concepts aren’t all that spiritual, or even all that psychological, since civilization would still have the need for defining vested interests via laws. Still, the imagery of the Tree of Knowledge as precipitating the Fall is a powerful archetype. There is powerful spiritual incentive to "know" the difference. Unfortunately, I don’t think it comes through our genes, and is as you say a product of intelligence.

Scripturalists read the words and convince themselves that Evil is a snake, or an apple, or a woman, or the man’s reaction to scapegoat the woman, who scapegoated the snake, who said, "but it was really a very GOOD apple, boss!" This can lead to the misconception that evil is something outside of ourselves - demons - rather than a product of our own contrariness.

I believe that good and evil are absolute concepts confused by a relative existence, but then I also believe that the snake’s boss gave him dominion over the humans after that apple stunt. This tends to make discernment of absolutes very difficult, which is pretty much where we’ve been ever since, isn’t it?

Perhaps I should back off of good and evil, as they do conjure absolutist thoughts, and go to right and wrong. While still subjective entirely to the human ("intelligent life") experience, even very small children can grasp the notion, and some even grasp it automatically. Or, as another analogy, the psychopath knows intellectually the difference between right and wrong, he is simply inclined by nature to do wrong. Sure, the ‘rules’ are in context of government or religion, but the need for rules exists even in isolated tribes and family groupings. Or does this example miss the mark?

Let me think about that for awhile, Michael, and I'll get back to it.

I think you're right about Ramapithecus... last I looked, paleontologists thought it was more likely on the orang-utan branch of the simian bush.

Sorry, I'm not sure I understand the question. If you are talking about fossil bones, they have no DNA as they are mineralized with all the original organic content replaced. You have to infer relationships from morphological similarities and observed dates.

The DNA sequences of chimps and humans are calculated to be 98% identical... in other words, in only 2% of the code have the DNA bases changed.

Ultimately, religious doctrine has to give way if it contradicts reality, if only to preserve the existence of the religious order that holds to the doctrine. It's akin to the fact that the only trees that remain standing in a storm are those that bend with the wind. There are (currently) only two possibilities: either creation was accomplished by evolutionary processes, or it was accomplished to look that way. Of the two, I prefer the first and simpler alternative. It's plain silly to look to revelation to figure out the "how" of creation, you need to get your hands dirty and look for actual evidence. That's where science comes in.

No problem. To be honest, I don't know that a consensus can be reached on such matters, but I don't think any act can/should be judged without considering the motivation. In the natural world, it seems to be survival, which I consider amoral (neither good or evil). Humanity has developed beyond that stage (I hope!).

Jim, good[whatever time of the day it is there.]

No of course I'm not, exactly the opposite in fact. I am saying that what I called the 'third voice' and later referred to as the moral impulse is not 'compelling.' Of course I use *my* judgement to decide whether or not to listen to it .. more is the pity. That is what makes me sit up and think .. because it *is* there, but it's separate, I can listen to it or not, therefore it is not in itself *mine* but something outside of me.

"The man died when the bullet passed through his temple." -- good or evil? You can not judge because it is without context."

I don’t know about you, but when someone dies by bullet, I automatically see evil due to the fact that a bullet is not a car crash or a tornado or even a heart attack. The information suggests murder, and murder is evil.

Or, to an alien being really trying to understand the difference between good and evil, meaning that he/she/it did not have a base of reference already, motivation would appear to be equal. The selfish "I Will" would have as much validity as the altruistic "He Needs."

While some claim there is no qualitative difference between good and evil, I don’t think they really mean it. Even science recognizes the necessity for ethics. Ethics are akin to morals, which we like to believe are spiritually based values. I think they are human values, the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge that got us in so much trouble and set us loose in a creation where we are the only ones confused about it (or perhaps the only ones dumb enough to be confused).

The information can also suggest an accident if a loaded weapon was mishandled. There is not enough information to say for certain.

An intentional car crash through road rage or drunk driving can be deemed as a homicide, however. A twister is out of our control and can only be viewed as a natural occurence. A heart attack usually (but not always) requires a preexisting condition and some sort of stimulus. Scaring someone intentionally with a heart condition which lead to a fatal heart attack can be viewed as murder.

Ummh, Dr. Hannibal Lecter portrayed in the film "Silence of the Lambs" was never a real person but a composite of several serial killers.

Not necessarily. In the best of worlds one would like to think that but the laundry list of atrocities committed in the name of research is pretty lengthly. One only has to look at the recent revelation that several thousand African American men were intentionally infected with syphillis prior to WWII and received no treatment until the disease ran its course.

In 1800, the boy of perhaps twelve or thirteen who had been wandering alone in the mountainous forests of southern France (Ave

(continued)

In 1800, the boy of perhaps twelve or thirteen who had been wandering alone in the mountainous forests of southern France (Aveyron) for an unknown time before his capture. Like other children who have grown up without human contact, the boy, who was later named Victor, was not socialized. In essense, he could not communicate with others or express more than the most simple of intentions. He did not now right from wrong in the sense that socialized human beings do. It was only with years of intensive training was he able to function at a somewhat normal capacity within society. Knowing right from wrong is not an innate attribute but rather a learned process.

...don’t know about you, but when someone dies by bullet, I automatically see evil due to the fact that a bullet is not a car crash or a tornado or even a heart attack. The information suggests murder, and murder is evil. - Joy Busey

To an Iraqi, it is not evil to murder an American; to a Palestinian, it is not evil to murder a Jew; to an Israeli, it is not evil to murder a Palestinian; to an Indian, it is not evil to murder a Pakistani, ad infinitum.

As I said before, good and evil are in the eye of the beholder.

It only is what you believe it is.

"it *is* there, but it's separate, I can listen to it or not, therefore it is not in itself *mine* but something outside of me."

Here I am still establishing that evil is the inside absolute, and you’re making excellent points to the outside absolute!

Don’t worry, all. The threads do meet. §:o)

<sigh> §:o)

Of course it could suggest an accident "if," E.C. It does not automatically do so, which was the qualifier on my statement. Conversely, a car wreck does not automatically suggest murder even though a car can be used to murder someone, and scaring your great aunt Martha to death for her money can be murder as well. But Martha’s nearly 90, and has a bad heart. A heart attack would not automatically suggest murder. "If" is a relative and circumstantial term. I could have named any of thousands of notable evil people, but chose the conglomerate. You recognized Hannibal’s evil right away, didn’t you?

And I never said young children learned all by themselves, I simply said they grasp moral concepts quite readily, some much better than others, as if their natures tended in that direction.

Surely you aren’t trying to tell me that murder is not evil just because a significant portion of the human race can be tricked, fooled or thoroughly misguided into believing evil is good, are you?

Joy .. I'm so sorry, didn't mean to interrupt your thread, wasn't thinking, very silly of me.

Now to the other point, E.C.

I said: Even science recognizes the necessity for ethics. Ethics are akin to morals, which we like to believe are spiritually based values.

You said: Not necessarily. In the best of worlds one would like to think that but the laundry list of atrocities committed in the name of research is pretty lengthly. One only has to look at the recent revelation that several thousand African American men were intentionally infected with syphillis prior to WWII and received no treatment until the disease ran its course."

I think this may be as absurd as Bernhard’s assertion that murder is fine if somebody tells you it’s fine. The existence of evil is the reason we need rules. That "Best Of Worlds" ain’t here, if it’s anywhere at all.

My primary query had to do with the nature of evil, which I thought we’d have little trouble establishing as something exclusively human (in lieu of extraterrestrial participants in the game to our knowledge). My Grand Plan was to go from there through the energy conservation argument that in a duality-based universe, the anti-evil must also exist. Instead, I find intelligent and apparently rational people who believe that evil cannot be evil simply because it exists. I’m speechless...

Woe! Hold on there! You are saying that an exclusively human construct is manifested in a duality based universe, namely, anti-evil. Not even Genesis hinted that mankind and his constructs had anything to do with the manner in which the universe was ordered. That certainly is a grand conceit.

I never said evil isn't evil. I am just hinting that as a human construct, it has nothing to do with the manner in which the universe operates. In other words, if humanity never flourished, it would have no impact on the universe as a whole.

There are good (moral) things, bad (immoral) things but outside the framework of our society the cosmos is profoundly amoral (neither good or bad just there)

I once heard a story about the great Rabbi who asked his student, "Who is the most tragic figure in the Bible?"

The student answered Job, and when the Rabbi shook his head he named others whose stories ended badly. The Rabbi’s head kept shaking.

Finally, the Rabbi said, "God is the most tragic figure in the Bible." It is God’s heart that breaks, His creation corrupted, His loneliness and longing that cries from all the pages.

These are of course metaphysical concepts, which are the playground of religion rather than science. But understanding is why we’re here. As Hermes Trismagestus once said (it is said) - "As it is above, so it is below." All things in a duality-based universe of space-time are founded upon the uncertainty of being. Particle or Wave, depending entirely on how you care to measure (look at) it. I’d hoped to convince a few skeptics that they’re missing something fundamental.

I am really trying to understand your point of view but I just can't see mixing metaphysical concept of "anti-evil" with actual dualities in nature such as lepton-antilepton pairs, the wave-particle problem, etc...

Bernard Schopper # 486 & 487:

Humans never had tails. The concept of vestigeal organs is only a "term" for something scientists. namely evolutionists don't understand, of why those structures or organs are there. My point being on that college web site, GILL SLITS aren't even mentioned. That's because medical science has learned more about the true nature of the developing embryo, and maternal-fetal circulation, yet evolutionists still cling to that embronic"link" with fish, when it's proven not to be true. Evolutionists don't seem to put the pictures of the mosaic together very well. Perhaps the facts need to be looked at more objectively.

Just saying 98% doesn't tell the whole story. Apes have 24 pair of chromosones, humans 23. Have geneticist unlocked the codes to all DNA links and information? A common ancestor for primates and humans is a stretch. Similarities in structure, like the gill slits are only superficial surface observances.

BTW, say HI to your great uncle "Might Joe Young" Tear-jerker?:-(

Thanks for answering my question on why DNA testing can't be done, that's very sensible, and too bad, a lot more could be learned. But as to how fossils remain to be examined at all, is amazing. Most animals or humans in known human history don't become fossils, due to the decomposition process after death. I guess the animal needs to be buried suddenly and compressed under many layers of earth and pressed into the rocks to get to be a fossil. How does that happen ?:)

Why are there no earlier fossils beneath the Cambrian level?

Joy .. "Other" would be my favourite word to describe God, and "Just" would probably be my most 'comforting.'

Never heard of Hermes Trismagestus, but what he said is interesting ..

What exactly did he mean by dualism? I have a feeling [having read your posts] that it's not dualism as I understand it. Which is briefly that while the Xian view is that this is a good world gone wrong, but which still retains the 'memory' of what it ought to be. The dualist in the religious sense, believes that two equal and independent powers are behind everything, one good and one bad and that this universe is some sort of battlefield. Personally I think the latter is the most credible alternative to Christianity but .. .. I'm digressing, do you happen to know what he meant?

Loved the Rabbi story.

I know very little of eastern religions, Jim. I know a little about the Bible since I have read quite a bit of what the scholars have written. Actually, the only thing I can think of that might be considered a non-textual religion is reincarnation. I am not sure if reincarnation is considered a religion, but it would certainly appear to me to represent a belief system.

I know of no specific text on which reincarnation is based, but I have the sense that belief in reincarnation is quite widespread. Actually, I have sometimes wondered how belief in reincarnation could possibly be maintained from generation to generation when there is no church or text on which it is based specifically. As near as I can tell, it appears to less prone for ambiguity and manipulation than textual religions. People just simply believe that when they die, they come back in the form of another person--although I do not know why they would believe such a thing.

Some fossils apparently have DNA. The original Neanderthal, whose DNA was recently examined by the scientists who came to the conclusion that Neanderthal could not have been in the direct line to modern man, due to too many dissimilarities in the DNA. Otherwise, it could have not been examined by the scientists.

When I started college I believed in evolution because everyone else did. When I started reading several books on evolution several years later, when I had time, due to an injury, I was able to compare that knowlege and theory to what I had learned after several years of practicing as a nurse. I'm a reader and read a lot of different things, and after seeing all the inconsistancies in the direction of evolutionary theory, and how it keeps getting changed to fit The Theory, makes me not have much faith in it a scientific supposition at all.

You certainly must have your own knowledge base that tells you everything points to evolution, I see the same things and don't see it. I don't have any problem with provable facts, but when I read that such and such occurred 50,000 million years ago, I ask, what dating methods are perfectly accurate? None. Is there any recorded data from 50,000 millions years ago? No. It's only a fantasy, not proved. Maybe circumstantial evidence only.

Circular again. Ok. I'll look at that one. I'm not looking at any more creation-bashing ones, though.LOL.

As above, so below. To unify all the threads of What We Know about the universe, we’re going to have to unify some concepts. Approach Symmetry. That will of necessity - in order to be useful in the long term - have to carry the baggage of human experience with it. If for no other reason than the fact that we asked the questions in the first place. All aspects of creation serve dual gods. That this conflict occurs in ourselves is readily evident, and the totality of ourselves is more than the statistical probability that the particles will actually exist at any given moment of time. There’s also the question of what determines their existence in between those moments of time.

That is my point of view. I cannot understand a point of view where evil does not exist because it is evident. It assaults my logic, which up to now I thought was pretty good. I’m sure you did not intend that, but it threw me for a loop.

Precambrian fossils certianly do exist but they are rare. Of these metazoans (cyanobacteria) are the most common organism detected.

Dave, I certainly never posted that evolution or science was an evil conspiracy. I did relate what I read about ICR, that the scientific community won't publish there research papers, and you explained why that was. You posted that they don't qualify as scientists, because they didn't measure up to the scientific standard. So I accept that. I don't agree, that they are not scientific. I also don't agree with them totally, as the evidence does suggest an older earth than just 6000 years. God's day wasn't neccesarily our 24 hour day. There's room for great flexibility on the age, not billions though.

Commonality between humans and primates, is there is some ways, in other ways, we are far different.

Thanks E.C. So the fossils below are bacteria, for the most part. That's interesting.:)

"As above, so below"

in whatever cuniform script was popular at the time. The story is that Hermes was the Father of Alchemy, and a large contributor to the Templar view of the world via Solomon and the original Temple in Jerusalem. My annotations to E.C. were merely feeble attempts to relate the tablet metaphysically, since that was Hermes’ specialty, after all.

I am not sure I understand what inconsistencies you refer to. Perhaps you can explain.

I think the first step is to recognize that certain fossils do exist. For example, when one looks at a skeleton of Homo Erectus, one sees a skeleton of a human. Never mind the dating. Just look at the skeleton. I would submit that in no way can this skeleton be considered that of an ape. The skeleton of an ape would be impossibly different. No comparison at all. At the same time, it can not possibly be the skeleton of a modern human. The shape of the skull is far too primative. The brain case is much too small. The brow ridge is far too defined, the jaw is far too robust. The question is: WHAT IS THIS? I say it can be an example of early man only.

Joy,

I must say I am a bit...well, I don't know what to make about your notion of the "anti-evil". Essentially, what strikes me is how antithetical this is to all traditional Christian notions on the nature of Good and Evil.

Essentially, as I understand Christian tradition, Augustine is responsible for the most broadly accepted understanding of good and evil. And I understand Augustine to boil down to:

God, the Creator, is good. Therefore, his creation is good. Things are good insofar as the are created, ergo, insofar as the have being. The Fall was a fall away from the perfect state of God's creation, to a lesser state of being. Therefore: evil does not exist in and of itself; evil is the privation of good. The analogy is to light and darkness. Clearly, both light and darkness exist. Except that light (the good) exists as a positive substance; darkness (the evil) is the absence of good. Therefore, despite Augustine's (incredibly flawed--as he himself demonstrates when trying to argue for it biologically against Julian of Eclanum [see Elizabeth A. Clark, "Vitiated Seeds & Holy Vessels: Augustine's Manichean Past"]) doctrine of original sin, he is nonetheless committed to the notion that creation is essentially good; only by a privation of the good does evil come to be.

How do you relate these ideas to your notion of evil as a positive and the good as the anti-evil?

Matt, Joy

Matt, hasn't heard of ‘anti-evil?'

Count me in.

And, I've never heard anything like this:

Now Joy.

You know better.

Looky here.

The totality of ourselves is more than the totality of ourselves under statistical probability, because we're all bipolar :). You're a practicing counselor, and you know what bipolar means. So, you know its consequences for statistical measurement at monadic anthropological scales. We are statistically more numerous personas than we are biological individuals.

The number of cohesive particles that will actually exist at any given moment is not isosmotic. Particles have bipolar sentience too :). Panpsychists always say that sentience exudes the universe! These little particle suckers experience bipolar sentience, mood swings mid-spin! From positive to negative in one charmed moment.

This means, statistically, that all particles are bipolar in the same way, but different from humans. Statistically, there are more quantities of expressive quanta-particle-feelings than there are numbers of mere particles :).

So, what is evil in the domain of bipolar anthropology? And, what is evil in the domain of bipolar sentient atomic physics?

Simple. Piece of cake.

Evil is the disintegration of fused positive-negative moronic harmonics at the atomic level :). For humans, evil is the loss of either pole: either too much passivity, or too much aggression. For particles ...

What?

Matt, Cliff

Ouch!

Matt, you're right that Ch'an is a textual religion.

I was thinking of an 8th century clash in Tibet between Chinese and Indian Mahayana Buddhists, entailing later Zen developments.

The argument almost (not quite) reduces to a dispute over dative-locative particles meaning "in," "at," "to" as locations of the source of enlightenment.

Cliff, the dispute sorta involved the thing you mentioned: reincarnation. That is, the force of good and bad acts presumably coming from mental concepts (cita-vicalpa) causes beings to wander in transmigration, enjoying heaven (svarka), as the reward of good acts. But, the Ch'an monks held that those who do not think of anything at all, and who do nothing, become wholly freed from transmigration (samsarat parimukyante), and thus attain Nirvana.

The Indian sect said that thinking and doing nothing is nonsense! They contested the Chinese sect's preference for viewing things from this ultimate venue of final truth. Still, the Chinese drew upon Ch'an ‘s historical reluctance to speculate metaphysically and its insistence on the abolition of reasoning. Direct insight is valued more highly than reasoned interpretation of the Sutras.

Anyway, some wandering insubordinate Chinese monks wanted to bypass the politics of textual interpretation by teaching instant enlightenment. This instant enlightenment, in contrast to gradual textual and meditative learning, purportedly involved the elimination of all differentiated knowledge and the achievement of some sort of primordial omniscience. The dative-locative source for this state of enlightenment was taught as one's own Buddha nature, lying within the innermost recesses of the individual.

The controversy ended in a knife fight :).

Surely you aren’t trying to tell me that murder is not evil just because a significant portion of the human race can be tricked, fooled or thoroughly misguided into believing evil is good, are you? - Joy Busey

Would it have been evil to murder Adolf Hitler? Or Stalin? Or Pol Pot?

In some cases, the end justifies the means, and if the preservation of a society is at stake, murdering those who threaten that society's existence is not evil.

Humans never had tails. - Marie M.

Neither have chimpanzees and other members of the Great Apes. However, their common ancestors had tails.

I do not believe apes have 48 chromosomes. Please cite some reference.

Ya I don't sense a lot of disagreement between us

In the religion of Science uncertainty can be said to lie at the cause of "free will" or it's equivalent. This solves the conundrum of free will itself.

"Understood" in the deterministic sense is one thing. Given that some things can be understood in the probabilistic sense is another.

The older religions always sought total determinism. Science places limits on this and shows other ways of rational thought. That is why it is a more advanced religion.

------------------------------------

Lots of very interesting ideas from all of the posters.

I'm glad there are some people here who understand religions besides monotheistic ones.

Living in Taiwan exposes one to many types of Gods and practices. I feel constantly challenged to understand other peoples beliefs.

Marie,

1) Dating methods - which dating methods are in error and why?

2) Pre-Cambrian - there are pre-cambrian fossils however it is important to note that prior to the cambrian "explosion" all life was soft bodied with no calcifid skeletal structure. This does not lead to effective fossilisation. It's actually a good indication for evolution.

3) You keep urging science to look at the data correctly, which suggested you see a conspriacy. I find it similar to UFOlogy. We have the majority of science in one camp saying no, and a vociferous minority in the other shouting yes. I see creationist in the same light. They are the ones using teh Bible as a source text without putting the bible through the same rigourous standards as the rest of science has to use. That's, in my mind, hideously flawed reasoning.

The evidence simply does not support the ICR and creation science(sic) - it really is that simple. Their theories are not supported by the data.

As for apes and humans, you still have to address the fact that a Chimp has more in common with a human, genetically and pysiologically speaking than it does with a Baboon. Why do you think that is?

I specificaly used the example of the man being shot because it elicits a certain reaction, in a vacume, but can quickly be shown to switch sides in certain circumstances.

The very concept that the universe knows good from evil is an incredible conceipt on our part! To imagine that our petty little acts effect the universe at large....

Very simple, really. Corpses that fall into seas, lakes and rivers are protected from land scavengers so their remains aren't dismembered, and are fairly quickly covered by sediments - this can even occur within hours or minutes in the case of floods & mudflows. This is how sedimentary rocks are formed, by the way, and these are the only fossil-bearing rock types. Then the sediments harden, and minerals replace the organic material of the bones. Tectonic movement eventually raises the sites of burial, & weather and other erosion (e.g. quarrying) exposes the fossils, and paleontolgists find them.

There are: the Ediacaran fauna whose relationship to present phyla is unclear; evidence of some kind of worm something like 1 billion years ago; and lots of bacteria. The Cambrian was a very long time ago (570 million years), so there is a lower chance of fossils surviving geological processes. Also, the only animals around at the time were soft-bodied - these do not fossilise as well as vertebrates unless they are rapidly buried in fine silts such as happened in the Burgess shale, where fossilization occurred before the corpses could decompose.

In general, the attitude of creationists is anti-science. When observations conflict with their ideas about how the world came into being, they ignore them - they can't possibly be true, because they contradict the bible. Some science. Then, rather than risk a challenge to their thinking, they avoid reading about evolution from scientific sources that know something about it, and get all their info from religious leaders who are largely ignorant of the subject.

Oh, and btw, if you want to overthrow the dating methods, you need to overthrow nuclear physics, as well as geology and evolution. Are any creationists publishing in this field? :) If so, they have their work cut out for them. The methods have been well worked out and substantiated. Independent methods give dates consistent with each other. Even if, say, the scaling was wrong, the relative dates would still stand.

The point is, Marie, that there is a vast, vast body of evidence pointing to an old earth, and the temporally sequential rise and fall of related animal species. This is incontrovertible, and needs explanation. You can dislike the evolutionary explanation if you want, though why you want to limit your god's powers in this way is beyond me, but if you do so, you have no alternative explanation. Now agnosticism about the explanation of the evidence is not unscientific, but it isn't satisfactory, and it just isn't the way science works in practise. Rest assured, if there is a fundamental flaw in evolutionary theory, it will be found. Meanwhile, it's all we have to work with. Without it, nothing in biology makes any sense at all, and we may as well stop practising that science. :)

Leszek Rzepecki - Thursday, 01/21/99, 9:25:16am (#546 of 546)

heard a story bout a guy who found a skull (don't remember the names) he thought it was about 2.6 million years old. He sent samples to be dated to several labs. His results (using c14 & another method) ranged from 204 million years to 200 thousand years with one coming in at 2.4 million. The archeologist published 2.6 million years. The dating methods need no help in being discredited.

Bill, look, do you know that this story is even true? No, you don't, and neither do I... was it a fossil skull? Was it actual bone? What exactly was dated and how? You don't know, so why flourish this as proof positive that dating doesn't work? That's pretty typical of the creationist approach to science. Ignore the thousands of carefully researched publications in geology and physics underpinning dating methodology, and focus on an unsubstantiated anecdote. No wonder creationism isn't taken seriously, not even by scientific critics of evolution. It's the creationist methods of rhetoric (since they don't do any actual science) that need no discrediting.

You don't date actual fossils, you date the volcanic sediments around them. You need to know exactly where the fossil was buried, in which sediment and between which sediments. You don't turn up in a lab with a fossil and expect to get a date, that just isn't the way it's done. Carbon dating can't be used with fossils, because they don't contain carbon. Organic remains can be dated by ¹⁴C dating - if they are less than about 50,000 years old... you can't get dates earlier than that by this method. Your example is full of holes, Bill...

I'm not trained in zoology and don't have an up-to-date reference, but in the book The Monkey Puzzle (1982) by John Gribbin (a British science journalist) and Jeremy Cherfas (a zoologist at Oxford U.) they address this question. Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes, chimps have 24. What happened was that in the case of humans, chromosome #2 is almost identical in banding pattern to two chromosomes that remained separate in chimps (or alternatively, that became separated in chimps). They only differ in 9 regions, and at appears that these differences came about by turning over a region of the chromosome. IOW, the same genetic info contained in 1 large chromosome in humans, is contained in chimps on 2 smaller chromosomes. This was accomplished either by fission of the large single chromosome (#2) to two smaller ones, or the reverse process.

So the genetic near-identity between humans & chimps is not just at gene sequence level, but in fact, is preserved at chromosomal level where the organization of the genes on the chromosomes is almost identical in both species, and the differences can be accounted for in a straight forward way.

The reference they give is Jorge, J. et al., (1980) The striking resemblances of high-resolution G-banded chromosomes of man and chimpanzee, Science 208:1145-1148.

Science in action.

I had a bad cold one time. I went to 3 different doctors to treat it. One doctor said I had the common cold. The other doctor said I had a cold with traces of bronchitis. The last doctor said I had I the cold with flu symptoms. Western medicine needs no help in being discredited.

BTW, I doubt the veracity of your story. 204 million years predates the first hominids by 200 million years. Any paleontologist worth his salt would no doubt order a second radiocarbon test for results like these.

Joy Busey

Please forgive my previous non-sensical post and my silly effort to say, "what? I'm lost!"

I'm deeply enjoying your posts. Very much. I want to take off on a tangent on each one.

I'd truly like to make more serious attempts to explore your understanding of what unites and distinguishes science and religion considering their metaphysical, psychological, textual, political, and other components.

I'm just lost on the "evil" thread.

How does evil pervade the universe? If "God" amounts to a universal, cosmic organizing influence, then is evil endogenous, or resident within God? If you think "evil" not susceptible to precise formal definition, can you offer a tentative, hypothetical, or even merely sketchy intuitive definition of evil? Do you find cross-religious (comparative) common elements toward a definition of evil? And, if we discount political prostitutions of true "faith," what then remains of evil? Is there some ontic source of evil detectable by science? Is science already somehow there, measuring, detecting, and reporting on evil, but just unable to identify evil as such?

I'm lost.

I'm Looking for a Date

Errrrr. Nothing personal.

Related to the thread on the limits of dating early humans, see Roger Lewins' The Origin of Modern Humans, reported on recently in Scientific American, which includes a history of paleontology, and a readable discussion of direct and indirect methods of dating using stratigraphic inference (based on layers accumulated from the bottom up), and direct methods involving potassium-argon and carbon.

Anyone wanting a date to discuss dating can find a curious paleontologist or two from U.C. Berkeley occasionally hanging out, discussing such odd topics at Zacharies' Pizza in Berkeley, where, at least one cook will make you a Piltdown Pizza :). Yum!

Rosemary

Hiya again!

So, let's say God is the source of an inner imperative (internal voice, insight, hunch, impression, whatever) that gives us a sense of moral "ought."

You noted in your last post that this inner "ought" does require some human reason, and, some human judgment in order to execute.

Again, let's say all this is true. Does God relate to all humans in this fashion? Or just some? Is the moral imperative universal, imparted to all humans on an equal basis? Or just some?

Thank you all for your posts to me, which I will try to answer in order of relevance. I have been busy today.

First to Jim, I never said evil pervades the universe, I said evil is an exclusively human trait in lieu of evidence that ET is evil as well. I was hoping to proceed logically from what is evident (the existence of evil) to establish the existence of the opposing concept. Once we got that far logically, we could speculate about why the opposing concept is not so obvious or demonstrable, in terms of a "fallen" creation.

For the record (once again), I am Christian. I was once asked by a well-meaning hospital functionary what "kind" of Christian I am. That threw me for a loop too. The only answer I could come up with in extreme circumstances was that I was the "kind" of Christian who believes in Jesus. I am still of the opinion that this is enough to qualify, even if many Christian denominations would disagree on details. I have never subscribed to the notion that details matter anywhere but here, where religion is a political entity. Jesus said the Law of Love is the whole of the Law. That is the law I follow.

Which would speak to the concept of reincarnation if I cared to, which I do not. I cannot imagine a crueler or more unusual punishment for existence, so I plan to take the back door Jesus left ajar when time comes to an end for me. Everything else I may or may not "understand" about the nature of the universe or the nature of humanity is acquired knowledge. All or any part of it could be in extreme error, which I will readily admit if shown to be in error. I cannot be shown to be in error about the existence of evil through the argument that evil cannot exist because it exists. Overloads my circuits. I do not apologize for that.

Good question in the context of your posted understanding of my words, Matt. I assure you that at no time did I identify evil as a positive thing, I identified it as an active thing as well as an inherant thing. This may be the product of our descent through nature (evolution), which is pretty logical even if I don’t buy it lock, stock and barrel. Cross nature - including all of nature’s violent offspring - with God-given intelligence, and it’s fatal. Inevitable. Evil.

The point I tried to make is that this inherant evil is countered by something else. Something not quite so recognizeable, possibly outside ourselves by virtue of a dimensional factor not shared. Hard to reach, just as the Singularity is hard to reach. As symmetry is hard to reach. I have publicly labeled it, for the benefit of all, "Anti-Evil," precisely because evil is evident in and of itself in our experience. If we were holding this debate just 400 years ago (drop in the cosmic bucket), I’d have been burned at the stake by now for heresy in performing this semantical somersault of definitions. My big "sin" on this board is believing we’re all reaching for the same answers. I’d like some of us to understand that, because I also believe we ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

§:o)

I can accept this statement with the qualification that it is a trait in SOME humans, not humanity in general. But I would still say that motivation (or the end goal) is a determinant of what IS evil.

Actually, I rather admire the concept of reincarnation balanced with karma. It is the ultimate balancing system, and answers the question of "why bad things happen to good people". Some of the research on the subject is absolutely fascinating.

Joy, Matt

Thanks for your reply.

I'll do my best to weigh in on the question of evil.

The very best online debate I've ever seen, all time, on the nature, scope, and limits of morality, as morality bears upon science and religion, was a debate in another forum, very hotly engaged between Matt and another gentleman. Their discussion rose to the level of authentic "forum" (Greek polis) exchange. I don't mean to impose the contents and spirit of another and different exchange onto your own interests.

Nor do I mean in any way to exclude or include anyone from participation.

But, I do hope Matt engages you here (perhaps the other gentleman will make an appearance?) because I think that your background, interests, education, style, and your sheer empathy for the human condition all make for the elements necessary to extend that other debate beyond its former development. I don't recall whether Matt has written directly, narrowly, on the question of evil.

How to proceed?

(concluded next post)

Joy, Matt (concluded)

Again, how to proceed?

Joy wrote:

I'm game.

Joy, this seems a daunting project. Maybe impossible.

But, worthwhile.

I won't press you further, now, for a clearer definition of evil.

I don't want to manufacture semantic controversies where instead you want to proceed by looking at "what is evident," that is, by looking at fact-sensitive expressions in concrete cases. If I'm mischaracterizing your sense of it here, please correct me.

I'd say that evil can't be defined.

I don't assert this on religious grounds. Whatever else evil is, I'd say it is the preponderance of a sense of distrust over a sense of trust in the benevolence of our total environment. A healthy sense of trust requires environmental reinforcement. Thus, all the facts of our total environment count.

Joy, I'd say that a most recent example of evil occurred in the holocaust. This evil affected many Jewish people and thinkers (E. Fackenheim, Neusner, and others) so profoundly that they can scarcely identify the "opposing concept," that is, concept of God, or of good. This horrible impasse is likely made worse in the case of the holocaust because evil became advanced by scientists themselves.

Is this example close to what you feel about how evil, "Overloads my circuits?"

Michael

Interesting post.

Hey, I still owe you a reply. Haven't forgotten.

Be back later ...

later ...

An aside on a later post: Golly, Michael! Here we are parsing "is" at the very same time the President of the United States is parsing the same word! Do we get a medal or something? §:o)

Motivation, as well as is, are both relativity-related qualifiers in this context. Relative is the nature of what is, so that’s fine. You must have missed my bell-curve post, where I explained how I see the good v. evil factor. At one end there’s Mother Teresa, who couldn’t choose wrongly if she tried, and at the other end is good ol’ Hannibal, whose evil is obvious to all. The vast majority of us are somewhere in the rest of the curve, making choices.

FWIW, I don't think there's any such thing as good or evil... there are only actions that cause effects. We decide whether the actions are good or evil by the degree of benefit or harm that we perceive to be a result. I'm not sure it's any more complex than that :)

Big smile on that one, Leszek. The Answer is simple. The paths we must follow to get there is somewhat treacherous, that's all.

"Is" being a relative term, after all... §:o)

I agree however this view is rational. Most religions that use the concept of good and evil are based on feelings and subconscious learning from their parents and members of their local community.

I have read and heard people programmed to believe in the old religions describe animals and even chemicals as, in and of themselves, evil or even the devil.

That is to say in the most absurd case ascribing the characteristics of a supernatural being to a simple set of atoms in a particular structure.

Very well put. I am in complete agreement. Right and wrong (good or evil) can never be considered measurable quantities manifest in the cosmos. Of all indices, it is probably the most open to interpretation depending on circumstance and time.

Some folk depend on religion to tell them which actions are "good" and which are "evil" - I prefer, and I guess I'm in good company, to think these things out for myself in a rational way, as I distrust arguments from pure authority, and thus morality by fiat.

Perhaps somewhere here is Jim Rapp's contribution from science to the derivation of morality. But even so, it could never be an absolute morality, and always provisional.

As Star Trek's Spock might say... "the greatest good of the greatest number". Now if were only that easy to figure out both the short- and long-term cost-benefit analysis for every action! <g>

I think that it was "the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few" but I could be wrong.

I am a die hard trekker. I embarrass my wife with the Borg outfit I wear to conventions. I threatened to wear it to her parents house over the Thanksgiving weekend /:-| (Mr. Spock face)

"Joy wrote:

I was hoping to proceed logically from what is evident (the existence of evil) to establish the existence of the opposing concept. Once we got that far logically, we could speculate about why the opposing concept is not so obvious or demonstrable, in terms of a "fallen" creation Joy Busey 1/21/99 3:45pm.

I'm game."

Thank you again, Jim. I have admitted more than once that my mind probably doesn’t work the same way as many other people’s minds, so this is a factor I should have recognized but did not. The idea that such a blind alley exists in anyone’s mind at this level of debate is utterly alien to me. I will have to adjust, and promise to do my best.

So many great points to address. I do hereby admit my weariness as a result of outside factors at this moment in time. So my concentration is not focused as it should be. Just received a serious body-blow to my reality, and I must deal with that first. Apologies to all I have not yet answered, and I will get back to you when reality allows, I promise.

I think you have the correct quote... I'm an indifferent trekker myself :) However, I think I prefer my (well, not mine, but I forget who said it first) formulation. "Needs" don't necessarily equal "greatest good". It's logically possible to find that the many have greater needs than the few, but that the greatest good, from some perspective, is nevertheless served by indulging the few. That's why we've been tying ourselves into moral and philosophical knots over this since we learned to think! And I think that's one reason for the retreat into religion, it makes decisions about good and evil as easy as slicing salami. The problem not recognized by religion is that not every problem in life is salami or should be sliced like it.

I've been opaque enough for this evening, I think <g>

E.C. #528: Thanks for the link on fossilization. I liked it because the author only presented her facts. It's interesting that a saline, and especially a hypersaline evironment aids the process. So seawater would be a good medium, especially at the bottom. Like maybe there was seawater all over the earth at some point? HMMM.

Cliff Beall: # 536: I read the link you provided, and looked at the pictures. I have no problem explaining the fossils. They are human, homo erectus is human, no difference. Microevolution of homo sapiens, but still the same species. We have pygmy tribes today that could explain the small size of that 600cc skull size. All the bones appear human.

What was interesting also was the mitochondial DNA and evidence of common ancestral descent from Africa. I have no problem with that. Thank you. Other things written showed the various theories to go along with the bones. I noticed that because of the way the fossil evidence went that evolutionists had problems with deciding if separate groups all evolved separately; but due to gene flow; all became homo sapiens. Usually, as the article pointed out separation of a group of species from each other causes separate species over time, that can't interbreed, but somehow man didn't follow the theory, did he?

I'm not trying to be critical just for the sake of it, I truly see it this way. I'm glad you provided the link. Thanks.:)

Homo erectus certainly had more human features than the earlier Homo habilis who was more apelike, but I doubt if we dressed him in a business suit and let him loose on the NY subway people would be fooled. The problem is, you see, its features are intermediate between modern humans and earlier hominids. When examined in detail, their skulls and skeletons are not identical or even closely similar to modern humans. Modern pygmies, in contrast, are fully human. There's more to those skulls than just size.

On the question of mitochondrial Eve and the multiregional evolution hypothesis, they are mutually exclusive. The genetic evidence points to a recent common ancestor geographically restricted to Africa. The competing (and now largely disfavored) multiregional origin hypothesis existed because the fossil evidence alone wasn't able to pinpoint the time and continent of origin of modern humans. Now we can, and it looks like there's nothing special about it after all - it was local just as expected.

E.C. - Thursday, 01/14/99 (#282)

Your lifespeed and mine are pretty different, I'm afraid. So I've been out of the system for so long you may well forget your remarks...and I'll keep it brief.

On 1/14/99 I said, referring to the Hebrew word yowm that many (most, really) translators translate as "day": "don't get too hung up on "day", or the fact that the word may be something very different... maybe not even constant. It's the best the poor scribe had available!"

You responded: "I think that the writers of the scriptures - being divinely inspired, would tend to use as concise a language as possible. If epoch was what they meant then why wasn't it handed down as epoch? If it was the fault of those who transcribed the original texts then why isn't the correction made?"

The point you need to understand ... well, actually there are many, enough to write a lengthy chapter on, but anyway... is that Hebrew is a language of small vocabulary. One word can stand for many concepts and ideas... they are very context dependent, and maybe that fact (small # words) explains the animate, in-your-face conversational style of its speakers ...also, the original scriptures were written in an older version of Hebrew and script (like Old English is to us), and the culture (and use of it) was essentially gone for a few millenia... from persecution, etc. There is also a spoken /cultural tradition that then, and still, flavors our "modern" interpretation. Much like our tradition (absolutely not true) has it that Geo Washington chopped down a cherry tree...etc Anyway, any lexicon will include "epoch" among the definitions of yowm. And the "correction" I suggest is needed is hereby "being made". Many others (scholars, authorities) have done such, as well, in other translations (versions) of the Bible. I also believe the scientific knowledge we have today points the way to the correction.

Here's another,

EC cont...

easier, example. Until very recently, there was no knowledge amongst any H. sapiens that dinosaurs ever existed. Not 3500 yrs ago (when Genesis was written down), not 400 years ago when the English scholars did the King James translation. Nor all the time in between when the church, and rabbis who carried forth the Torah in the Jewish history. Today, knowing about them, I can see in a certain Hebrew word, all the qualities of such an animal, and choose to translate it as such. 400 years ago, the King James translators even knew ONE translation could be "dragon", but in their eyes none such existed and such a translation was not allowed.

Now, one more minor remark, a technical correction for you. You also responded to me:

"The shifting of T-Rex's presence to some other epoch other than the Cretaceous would invalidate several fossil dating techniques. Until creationists can come up with a successful

E.C. - Thursday, 01/14/99 (#283)

In response to my saying, "When the Bible says the stars appeared, that is from an earth-surface perspective. You and I are still seeing the light(s) appear, arriving from distant bodies and events." (Which is only one possible explanation I give, in my writing, for that verse in question. Another, for instance, involves the clearing -from translucent) of earths atmosphere. Another involves the clearing up of the "debris" of early space) ... you have essayed:

"Maybe I can help you out. Current cosmological principles dictate that following the big bang, temperature where so high that the expanding universe was essentially radiation dominated. With time, the differentiation (??) of the fundamental forces occurred .... etc."

And, finally, you concluded: "In essence, light (the radiation era) preceded stars (the matter era)."

Well, actually you concluded: "There I have helped you out enough. I'll ignore that (was that being smug and presumptuous, or actually sincere?) Since I don't think you have.

But my point, in this response is to draw you attention to the Bold type (my emphasis was thus added). I don't care what you believe. I respect it, acknowledge that you have your reasons (sometimes good, sometimes blind faith), and I often share both your beliefs and reasons. But I want to emphasize that CURRENT means that. Recent, still even a challenge to what other good scientists believe... in other words, both debatable and being debated. Maybe not current too long. And PRINCIPLES is a rather strong (mis?)use of the word, for theories, hypothesis, etc. And principles, or theories or hypotheses, do NOT DICTATE anything. They suggest, argue, even convince some, but in SCIENCE, they do not dictate. That's elementary philosophy of science. And finally, I (??) What you meant in that statement.

And about "I

"Joy, I'd say that a most recent example of evil occurred in the holocaust. This evil affected many Jewish people and thinkers (E. Fackenheim, Neusner, and others) so profoundly that they can scarcely identify the "opposing concept," that is, concept of God, or of good. This horrible impasse is likely made worse in the case of the holocaust because evil became advanced by scientists themselves.

Is this example close to what you feel about how evil, "Overloads my circuits?""

My apologies for not answering this before I hit much-needed hay.

Evil is an absolute, so I believe. The expressions of evil are relative. It all boils down to the lessons learned. In perspective, Hitler is no worse than Pol Pot, or Chairman Mao, or George Armstrong Custer. Or even Hannibal Lechter. Death is death. Life is life. My circuits are overloaded by logic-traps that have no "then" to modify the "if."

Human beings are evil. Nothing else in creation is evil, it simply "Is." This is why I am skeptical of demonology, or any ology that scapegoats anything outside of ourselves for our tendency toward evil. Evil is the heart of our beast. Primary to the Jewish struggle to establish meaning, a brilliant concept way too far ahead of its time, is the "other." There cannot be one without the opposing one.

EC concluded:

And about "In essence, light...." The "radiation era" is a curious term, is that radiation yowm ? :) But, in a more serious vein, the radiation was lots of other stuff, likely not much in the light spectrum. And the essentials of cognitive and information theory would suggest that a universe full of "noise" ie a universe of undifferentiated energy and radiation AND matter (like, before stars) is not the time the verse is referring to, ie the time of a solid earth that is about to be, or is already being blessed with living things.

This is not a point I would argue with. But precisely where do you find that word that might be translated as "dragon" or "dinosaur" in Genesis 1 or 2?

Absolutely correct. Carbon 14 has a half life of 5,730 years. It is a very good method of establishing the date of organic material up to about 30,000 to 40,000 years in age. The maximum age of material for which it can be used is about 70,000 years. After that, the margin for error increases dramatically.

It is not all guesswork. If a fossil has a close association with volcanic ash/lava, potassium-argon dating may be possible, and it, also, is a good dating method. By permitting absolute and reliable dating in certain cases where a fossil is closely associated with volcanic ash or lava, the "guesses" of the relative dating of similar fossils not associated with volcanic activity are improved.

Leszek Rzepecki - Sunday, 01/17/99, (#377)

I thought to ignore the short debate twixt you and Cliff, and it seemed you had amicably, and reasonably concluded it ... ie "no big deal". BUT THERE YOU GO AGAIN!!

" I agree that 1 Kings 7:23 is a minor error that doesn't (or rather, needn't) call the veracity of the whole bible into question. However, an error is an error for all that, in a supposedly inerrant document. In this case, it has didactic usefulness, because it allows us to ask two questions...First, how can we know that the bible is in error? ....The second is, how can we tell when the literal word of the bible must be taken literally, and when can it be taken metaphorically, or even just approximately?"

You give a pretty good discussion, but what's the point. I would suggest your second question should have gone a bit further... ie "...,or even just reasonably"

For example:

If the CEO of GM put out a warning detailing the safety problems with the latest Sport Utility vehicle they had manufactured, and he said, "This 3000 pound vehicle can turn upside down if driven over 40 mph...", would you dismiss him as an idiot, or the article and warning as worthless because we (scientists) all know the vehicle in question actually weighs 3170 pounds (when there are 8 gallons of gas in the tank)? Obviously, only to your own peril.

Cliff Beall - Thursday, 01/21/99, (#578)

Hi Cliff.

You asked: "But precisely where do you find that word that might be translated as "dragon" or "dinosaur" in Genesis 1 or 2?"

In Genesis 1:21 the word the KJV translates "whales". The Hebrew is (transliterated) tanniyn. Amongst the definitions accepted/included in most lexicons are "dragons, land monsters, sea monsters, sea serpents". There are several other reasons, besides the location in the "outline of origins" of the word, that speak for its inclusion, including the emotional content, aspects of motion that accompany this collection (which do not match with "whale" at all, and Hebrew uses motion and type of mobility as a fundamental classificatory catagory).

And as to your "Russell Husted said: These are all "guesses", but guesses that are presumed high in reliability, well accepted, consistent with other accepted guesses... in other words, we like the answers... they fit what we already believe." and your response. "It is not all guesswork. If a fossil has a close association with volcanic ash/lava, potassium-argon dating may be possible, and it is a good (rough, I would say) method. By permitting absolute and reliable dating in certain cases where a fossil is closely associated with volcanic ash or lava, the "guesses" of the relative dating of similar fossils not associated with volcanic activity are improved."

Hey, I agree. They are guesses that, understanding their limits (which are severe and close to fatal, at the far reaches of prehistory, and DO NOT give much concrete substantiation to most postulated evolutionary sequences - in fact those sequences depend much more on other criteria and presumptions), I accept the rough outline being established.

Trying to catch up....Russell H

Cliff: (#s411, 414)

A coupe of things you've said, ie, "According to my Bible, in Genesis 2:4-7 it says specifically that after God created the heavens and the earth, he created a man. Then we read in Gen 2:18-19 that God decided that man needed to have some company ( that should read "mate" ) so He created all the beasts of the field and fowls of the air..."

Now the problem for you here, is that you should understand that that is a parenthetical reminder...ie that He who had made ALL the animals...etc, now brought them to be named which, in the scripture, and Hebrew beliefs, is equivalent to "knowing" them... names are much ado about essence, and knowledge, and the dominion Adam was to have (dominion requires knowledge of)and ..., we have read, and have reaffirmed in the next statement, "but none were appropriate for Adam".

" so finally, according to Genesis 2:21-22, God took a rib from the man and made a woman." Now, I do believe that is a very erroneous translation, (and tho some to whom I've proferred my own that is an unacceptable opinion, most find it gratifying and a relief...

" Now my best understanding of the fossil record is that man is a fairly recent addition to the animal kingdom, the branch from the great apes (common ancestor) is only about 4 million years ago. All the "beasts of the field" and "fowls of the air" are considerably older than man. Assuming this to be correct, the Genesis account is technically incorrect."

As I just said, you've only failed to realize that the repeat of the "creating all the beasts, etc" is a parenthetical reminder. Genesis 1 is the bulk of the creation account. And there, man comes at the end... "technically correct" Genesis 2 recapitulates, and then directs our focus to another concern...

Bernhard Schopper - Tuesday, 01/19/99,(#442)

Bernard, that post was so rife with errors (in my opinion, of course), I don't want to even try to debate it, but would rather turn you on to at least one site (which is at the cutting edge of all your numerous topics there (ie cognition, brain neurology and biology, etc). I haven't got the hang of how to include a link here, so here it is written out://cogprints.soton.ac.uk

The site is Cogprints Archives, and is assosiated with NSF and DOE, so its top notch.

Jim, you remind me of a 'sprite' .. I get the feeling you're up above me somewhere, waiting to jump on me full of glee saying "Gotcha." Funny the tricks the mind can play on you.

I do think that yes, but if I remember correctly, this started in a more abstract fashion .. does that moral 'voice' exist.

Yes, in effect, each person either 'amplifies' or 'subdues' possibly depending on their familial and educational achievements.

It's universal in my experience. However, if it has been subdued a lot .. it is hardly heard and very easy to subdue.

OK, drop the brick, what have I forgotten?

...and at the other end is good ol’ Hannibal, whose evil is obvious to all. - Joy Busey

Leszek or anyone ..

I don't know enough yet to add to this discussion, but I've started investigating!! However it struck me that the above is very similar to the cosmological argument for the existence of "something other." To the fact of causality, every event has a cause, which in turn has a cause, and so on back to a first cause!

If the bible is taken as the literal word of god, and cannot be mistaken, then any error in it, however minor, disproves that belief. You may think any particular error is too trivial to matter in this case, I don't. The literal inerrancy of the bible has been disproven. If instead the bible is taken as the word of god as interpretated by fallible scribes and scholars, then there can be a lot of leeway in interpretation, and mistakes need not be fatal to the document.

My question then is: why on earth would anyone expect to see any accurate reflection of the history of the earth or evolution in a document written by scholars who knew little of science in any modern sense. Vague similarities in temporal sequencing such as the late arrival of human beings (which is inevitable in the evolutionary account, since only human beings have the intelligence to recognize the existence of the fossil record, so there's no surprise there) in Genesis is more likely to be coincidental. It's no more valid than the prophesies of Nostradamus or the predictions of a TV psychic... if you make the story vague enough, something about it is likely to fit any version of reality.

If it comforts you to think that Genesis in some way presages modern scientific knowledge, that's ok. But it can't be shown to be more than coincidence, even if it actually *were* more than coincidence, because it's just not specific enough (I mean, dragons, indeed... any great beast of modern time would do, and fossils certainly weren't unknown in those days... it's quite plausible that fossils bones of a whale or dinosaur lent themselves to legend). But please don't ask scientists to sift Genesis for clues about what to look for in the scientific world... they aren't likely to find them. At most, they may find guesses as to how savvy the ancients who wrote Genesis were, and what isolated bits of knowledge they had (they certainly weren't stupid), but hardly proof that they had enough of a modern understanding of the nature of reality to describe the origin of life and the universe as we know or imagine it to be.

Finding correlations between Genesis and modern science is a dubious enterprise.

I agree with all you say here, and would like to add another point. Let us say that one does make a convincing equation of a scientific theory, or family of scientific theories, with some part of a religious text. History shows that the science is very likely to change, especially when it concerns something as speculative as the origin of the universe.

So, when the science changes, does the religion change too? I somehow do not think this would be acceptable to many of the people who try to equate aspects of science with, say, Genesis.

Now let us make the unlikely supposition that it is declared okay to simply reinterpret the religious text when science changes. Well, I would content that in this case, the religion is serving no useful purpose. Hmmm... didn't this happen with the Catholic church? :-)

Andrew D. Lewis - Friday, 01/22/99, 10:23:59am (#587 of 587)

NO

Bill, just checking to see if you were reading. :-)

Also, I would like to clarify my earlier point. When I said "no useful purpose" I meant with regard to science. I do not believe that religion serves no useful purpose, although it does not for me. Sadly, the usefulness of religion is too often marred by its downside. But that is another topic, suitable for another forum.

I am still playing catch-up, so please bear with me! I apologize for not going back and back to link with the full posts.

Carl Nicoli #542 - "In the religion of Science uncertainty can be said to lie at the cause of "free will" or it's equivalent. This solves the conundrum of free will itself."

I also do not see a lot of disagreement between us, Carl, and you make a good point. I would disagree in principle with science as a religion rather than a quest, but perhaps the two words speak to essentially the same concept of totality.

In which case, it would seem to be rational that if "free will" is inherant in Uncertainty, the principle of Uncertainty would be attributable to the ‘good v. evil’ question as well, on the levels I have noted.

Perhaps the primary area of disagreement between science and religion boils down not to God, but to death. A rather self-centered way of looking at things, but humans are nothing if not self-centered. Many scientists and atheists assert that because there is as yet no empirical evidence that the self exists apart from the machine which houses it in this time-space, the self is nothing more than energy through the wiring. When the machine breaks down, the self goes away as if it never was. This to me is a sad and lonely situation.

Religion attempts imperfectly to reassure its adherants that the self does survive breakdown of the machine. It comforts people’s fear that all our experience of life and its vissitudes is meaningless. Not so sad and lonely. I simply suspect that science does itself no favors by ignoring the consciousness factor, and that religion does itself no favors pretending it has all the answers it needs.

Michael Willis #556 - "Actually, I rather admire the concept of reincarnation balanced with karma. It is the ultimate balancing system, and answers the question of "why bad things happen to good people". Some of the research on the subject is absolutely fascinating."

I do agree that the concept of reincarnation balanced with karma would provide an easy answer to the inequity (unfairness) of life on earth, and I do not rule out the possibility of truth in its tenets. My primary problem is that life is ‘unfair’ to the vast majority of human beings, accross the entire spectrum of human experience. The Buddhist concept of life as suffering is apt, though I have personally chosen to take another bus off this rock when the time comes. I’ve got no desire to start all over again. Wealth or power could not entice me, which is truthfully about the only real enticement I’ve ever seen offered for being ‘good’ this time around. ‘Good’ being, presumably, putting up with inequalities and suffering. That’s a logic trap I plan to avoid, as I’ve got better things to do with eternity than play this game forever, never really knowing why. It’s meaningless, and I prefer meaning.

"... Microevolution of homo sapiens, but still the same species. ..."

<clunk> <clunk> <clunk> ! (The sound of my head striking my desk!)

There is no micro/macro distinction in evolution. This terminology was invented by the CRI as a CYA when they were shown, publicly and repeatedly to be utterly incorrect in the assertion that genetic drift does not occur.

Evolution is a process, not an event. Humans and Chimps (who share anscestors) can not mate. Humans and human progeniters? Who knows, they are not around anymore, having adapted into, well.... us.

Marie,
The "beating" comment was not an accusation of any sort at all, it was an illustration that a question can be formed, intentionaly or otherwise, that can not be answered correctly.

That no one can answer the question, "When did you stop beating your children?" with a succinct date without admiting they beat their children does not establish guilt, it establishes that the question is poorly framed.

Follow-up to Michael and all interested - To further clarify my previous statements regarding reincarnation, I would add that bad things happen to bad people as well as good people, and good things are pretty much spread evenly too. This could be arguable in terms of too short lives, children who die young of accidents, disease or abuse. But I am getting on in years myself, so am of the opinion that life is always too short, even if I make it to 120. There will still be questions unanswered.

I am not averse to the thought that it may be my own monumental ego that tells me this experience ‘ought’ to be meaningful, a conceit and nothing more. But because Jim is right to note we are all bi-polar, my Up Side tells me it’s something more. I began life seriously dyslexic, meaning the right-left brain connection is particularly permeable. They didn’t yet have a name for it back then, so I was instead labeled "weird."

My right brain, seeing the universe in conceptual form (image), keeps feeding me information the left brain (logic, language) has a hard time translating adequately. I really do write backwards if I’m not careful, which solves the translation problem. Of course, that means it’s not legible unless it’s held up to a mirror, but that’s not so much trouble. I type much better in forward motion, and promise not to get too weird.

Science is not a matter of believe. It is a matter of evidence. I was relating some of the evidence in support of the Big Bang Theory and dating techniques. Factual erros were oversights on my part and have nothing to do with the soundness of the techniques employed. Evidence not belief is the basis of science.

Obviously you have never heard of the Plank function. As the universe expanded and cooled, it passed through a range of black body temperatures which generated EM radiation coinciding with the visible spectrum (light). At the end of the radiation era, the mean temperature in the universe was cool enough (6000 K) to generate light in the violet part of the spectrum. Roughly 600 million years latter, the universe had cooled to 250 K which coincides with the near infrared portion of the spectrum. This of course, occurred before the formation of galaxies, stars, planets, earth, and life.

And the essentials of cognitive and information theory would suggest that a universe full of "noise" ie a universe of undifferentiated energy and radiation AND matter (like, before stars) is not the time the verse is referring to, ie the time of a solid earth that is about to be, or is already being blessed with living things.

Nonsense. As early as the quark lepton era (10E-7 s), matter and energy had begun to differentiate. By the time that cosmic background temperatures were cool enough to start shining in the ultraviolet, the isotropy was broken and matter was coalescing in what would become protogalaxies.

So according to present theory light occurred before the formation of stars. That is the beau

(continued)

That is the beauty of science. If evidence comes to light that casts the entire cosmological big bang framework into doubt then so be it. In fact, it will be good for science. However, twisting the scriptures to match the evidence is contrived and serves nothing but a creationist agenda

Greetings, my friend! I admit to some befuddlement on Russell’s posts, which is why I haven’t answered them directly. I am unsure of his point. Because I have also run into blind alleys in getting my own points accross, I am unwilling to compound my ignorance by enjoining too specifically.

Unless we find at the next stage of unification that we have missed a fundamental that would undo everything thus far done, I do not expect the Bang theory to end in significant error. At the same time, I fail to see how the existence of light (in measurable spectra of the EM emissions) prior to existence of galaxies and planets twists anything in the scriptures. I think you and I agreed awhile back that there was no essential conflict in this, even if the Genesis story is not an adequate guide (roadmap) to scientific endeavor, because it is something else entirely. "Let there Be Light" is first, and current scientific theory supports that. How nice.

Hi Joy

My only intention was to provide a reason from the realm current cosmology as to why light was evident before stars were created in the book of Genesis in order to circumvent the nonsensical answer that he presented before - the light from the stars had not yet reached earth. In essense, I was trying to help. But creationists appear not to need help in the applying scientific principles to origins of the cosmos. Can anyone say International Flat Earth Society?

Bernhard Schopper:

I just have to respond to the 3 quickies you posted Wednesday. In #485:

" What is the nature of Evil? - Joy Busey" you answered, "Good and evil are in the eye of the beholder."

Absolutely correct. I agree! Which is why the 2 -3000 yr old (and, really, much longer) debate about good and evil, and relative or absolute morality, and whether science or society can somehow write any acceptable set of rules, is so pointless. Jeffrey Dahlmer not only approved of his own deeds, there are a few other kooks who also do. Street gangs doing drive-by shootings have a fully developed moral code (intelligently composed, except in the opinion of a victim or "principled dissenter). The holocaust (that oft-quoted event -because it seems so obvious a point we all agree on) was performed by a people who not only did it, but planned it and approved it. And I can introduce you to thousands of people today (not only "skinheads") who still approve it. And anthropologists have documented incredible ranges of moral values, even values that are plainly suicidal to their holders/adherents. If we apply the usual explanatory principles of evolution, such as natural selection and the presumed corollary of "survival of he fittest", human history is a total anomaly. H. sapiens, with its unending history of genocide and conflict should have perished... No other species has such interspecific conflict and destruction. It certainly contravenes a lot of lesser theories, like population genetics and whoever has the most progeny etc. And, before you apply the "survival of he fittest" doctrine to the so-called "winners" in the wars and sweep of history, recognize that essentially 99% of the winners are already gone, they didn't survive. In fact, Israel is the triumph of a people who all but disappeared through nearly 2000 yrs of losing. Indeed, the US was started by various "losers", in evolutionary terms.

in (#486) you gave a l

in (#486) you gave a little "primate behavior" information, in the form of a bald assertion, when answering "I do admit it would be certainly easier for womankind to have babies without that pesky coccyx, though. - Marie M.". You said, " Bear in mind, that our foremothers (Now that is an extraordinary term!! Boldly going where no man has ever...), the monkeys, give birth while squatting. Their tails probably support such a position." I have never seen any such observation. Can you cite one? If it is to be a scientific explanation and contradiction of Marie's point it needs far stronger proof. AND, why the tail has disappeared from the H. sapiens, who also give birth in similar positions. Did we invent chairs and saddles in time to account for the evolutionary disappearance?

And finally, in (#487), you said: " Here is a list of DNA similarity between the human species and other primate groups: galago - 58% capuchin monkey - 84.2% vervet monkey - 90.5% rhesus monkey - 91.1% gibbon - 94.7% chimpanzee - 97.6% creationists - 100%" .

I think that was a bit uncouth and unworthy.

Jim,

thanks for the kind words. btw--I only just now got an email you sent me at the beginning of the month--I have two accounts and rarely check the one connected to my NYT subscription. Will write back shortly.

Joy,

I'm having trouble with your concept of evil.

Only insofar as good, also, is an exclusive human trait--for only humans valuate things as evil, everything else "just is". Likewise, beauty, ugliness, earnestness, sloth, concern, etc. are "exclusive human traits". I don't understand the logic of privileging evil in this way.

Well, as I tried to point out, I don't think the "existence of evil" is at all evident. I, and here I believe that Christian tradition is on my side [for once! ;-)], believe that "evil" does not exist in and of itself. There is God's creation, which is Good. When goodness ceases to be, that privation of good is called evil, just as "darkness" does not exist in and of itself--drankness is simply "not light".

Jim said he wasn't going to pin you down to a definition of evil, but I think I would like to hear your ideas. I don't know how we can proceed with "evil" unless we know just what you mean by that. My understanding of evil, as much as I understand the direction in which you want to take your argument, denies a necessary foundation to your entire enterprise.

Russell

This is patently false. Where is the evidence that Israelites prior to, say, the Seleucid Empire, held this belief? The name-knowledge correlation is a Greek idea, so far as I know. Fo you have any Hebrew evidence for this?

I must admit, the more I find out about your theory of the meaning of Genesis, the shakier I think it is. What is the title/ publisher of your book, and is it available yet?

Matt, I am not knowledgeable enough to argue with all the 'nuances' that those of you who know the orginal language can talk about. But what Russell said about the possible alternatives for "whale" seemed quite possible to me. I've often wondered about the alternatives offered in most translations for Job 40:15ff. That of an elephant or a rhinoceros I think, can the original word for 'tail' be wrong or are the translators putting in a word[s], because they couldn't in fact come up with a correct translation?

Sorry Matt, did that without checking first, the reference is right but it was a hippopotamus.

E.C. Thankyou for your links, I particularly enjoyed the second one and have kept it. Craters on the moon .. my tummy hurts. What a lot of debate, I suspect people on both sides have some strand[s] of their faith involved, or they have built their faith on what they thought was a 'rock' and it crumbled and they fight to restore it. Didn't someone say that a 'little' knowledge is a dangerous thing? I'm not sure that a 'lot' is all that hot after reading that.

Joy, Jim, anyone interested (or bored)

Anway, to the task at hand: further thoughts on the existence of evil

I have stated a traditional Christian position, namely that "evil" does not exist in and of itself, but rather it is a privation of good. This was a doctrine which Augustine held. Augustine also left us with the severely flawed doctrine of "Original Sin" associated with the Adamic fall, a doctrine which, as some scholars have pointed out, resonates mightily with the (ultimately deemed heretical) dualistic cosmology of Manicheaism, to which the young Augustine devoted his study. I would like to offer a non-religious defense of the notion of evil as privation of the good, and not something which is evident in and of itself.

Morality, everyone must admit, at some level is created by human beings. Either it is writ small in our human genes, writ large in the books we choose to read as divinely inspired guidance, or we simply make it all up as we go along. Designations of good and evil have as a proximate, if not ultimate source those pronouncing the designations: we humans.

I have argued in other forums like this that the most fundamental tenet of all human moralities is: to be alive is better than to be dead. This involves a non-verifiable, non-quantitative value judgement which we all take for granted. I believe this is the foundation upon which all moralities are constructed: murder is evil, torture is evil, lying is evil, etc. The imposition of a moral set seeks to limit these "evil" things because they, at some level, threaten the life of those who impose the moral set. Whether this springs from divine mandate, ge

Joy, Jim, anyone interested (or bored)

continued....

Whether this springs from divine mandate, genes, or social constructions does not matter. All that matters is that "to be alive is better than to be dead" is itself a moral assertion and, in fact, the most basic of all moral assertions.

Now the questions: what does it mean to be alive? And, what does it mean to be dead? I'd like to argue that these "to be alive" and "to be dead" are reducible to "to be" and "not to be", as the Bard put it. For humans, life itself is equatable with existence. Why? Because we know we are by our ability of self-reference; we can name this thing "I", and at the most primal level this "I" is all we can know to be real, to exist. Needless to say, once dead (so far as we know, and more importantly, popularly believe) everything to which we can confidently point as being "I"--this skin, these bones, this rubbery flesh--everything we can demonstrate to ourselves to possess existence--this all suddenly loses the ability of self-reference. It is no longer this being "I", and it loses the knowlege that "I" exists. A corpse is not a human; the human that was has ceased to exist. We care not a fig about the atoms of which we are made; the sum of the parts is not more than the whole, not even close. That is why the question of life and death is not mere a question of state of being; it is an unequivocably existential question. When a person lives, that person exists; when a person is dead, that person, not the corpse, but that person does not exist. Existence, non-existence. Being, non-being. All morality is founded upon the single moral: to be is better than not to be.

The upshot of this? That which is morally good is that which preserves existence--a principle which is extended to whatever a particular moral set designates as the proper order of existence. All moralities posit not simply that things exi

Joy, Jim, anyone interested (or bored)

continued....

All moralities posit not simply that things exist, but that there is a proper ordering of that existence. This is reflected in our term cosmos; in Greek it means "order", and kosmoi means "ordered" with the implicit connotation of properly ordered. That which can be called evil is that which is not existence in its proper state and order; it is non-existence, it is chaos. Chaos is not a thing in and of itself--it is the lack of order. Moralities therefore begin with a positive foundation of the correct state of being; secondarily, various states of non-being are the threats to this moral good: these are "evil".

That's why I don't think it makes much sense to posit first that there exists evil and then to adduce the good as a relation to evil. I believe that all moral sets work in fundamentally the opposite way: they first posit the good and then against it they posit the "not good" and name it "evil". Evil is the absence of good, regardless of what one posits as the ultimate source of morality. I don't think that any moral set at essence asserts that evil is evident as part of nature, human or otherwise. They merely acknowledge the propensity toward chaos, the possibility of the cosmos becoming akosmoi if you will. But not even that possiblity is itself evil; it is only the fruition of the possibility which is evil; that is, it is a lack of good.

So, to sum up, that's why I think any attempte to prove the existence of an anti-evil is ill-fated; the very notion of evil is morally posited only in relation to the primary assertion of "what is good". The good is itself the "anti-evil" and one must first start with assuming that it exists before one may assert that the evil [fundamentally the "not-good"] exists. Essentially, I see it as begging the question.

You make good points, but to me the difference still is in the realm of homo sapiens. I've seen people who look like the models they made from the skull profiles, like I mentioned before certain pituitary disorders can cause gross skull overgrowth and enlargement, also in reverse, smaller sized people. We've all seen midgets and dwarfs, in our life times. And we've seen giantism .

I haven't forgotten your excellent post on genetic information for primates. It's the week end, I have more time.

You are certainly correct that the Bible is not technically a science book. I do believe it does contain truth and like E.C. givng a scientific reason of why there factually could be light before the sun and stars were created, certainly is gratifying( thanks E.C.) As Truth the Bible account will stand. All this information is certainly a lot to comprhend.

Dave On and Bernard Schopper I will answer your posts. It's busy during my week.

Russell Husted: I think Bernard Schopper was teasing when he wrote about the quips of :creationists 100% and so on. I hope so :) They made me laugh anyway.

Keith Fosberg: In regards to the question: When did you stop beating your kids? I didn't get what you meant at the time. You're right, that unless the question is asked corectly, no good answer can be given.

I personally only use the term to try to designate, that within species there are many variations, due to environment, etc. But I don't believe that one species develops into another species group. I don't like the term myself. But as on that link, the terms are used by evolutionists also.

I have often wondered at the description given of the animal in that passage of Job 40:15-24. My little reference says an alligator or a hippo. But with a tail like a cedar, I doubt, that would be a hippo, and alligators aren't thought of as a creature that would drink lots of water. I guess I've wondered if the passage refers to a dinosaur. The passage is also very poetic in the way it's written, KJV, that is.

Matt, admit it, you just have a problem with drakness/darnkness etc., why not indeed. Just wanted to thank you for those last posts, cleared a few things up for me, made others clearer .. guided me as to what I want to follow up .. excellent, very helpful. Oh, BTW, you didn't spell check the last paragraph either, but the rest was stunning spelling wise and every other wise.

Hi Russell. With respect to dating of fossils:

I guess I fail to see the "agreement" to which you refer. For one thing, I do not agree that the limits of the dating of the fossil record is "severe and close to fatal." I would agree that dating of fossils is sometimes problematic, but, fortunately, a substantial number of ancient fossils have an association with volcanic activity. Sometimes it is because of volcanic activity that fossilization occurred.

When a fossil is found to exist between two layers of sediment which can be dated, I think it is reasonable to assume that the fossil must have an age somewhere between the ages of the two layers. In some cases, the association with a layer which can be dated only provides a minimum or maximum age for the fossil. But that, also, can be useful in establishing evolutionary sequences--in combination with other evidence that may be available.

Actually, the evidence is often quite straightforward. I think it can be said that most evolutionary sequences which have wide agreement within the scientific community have more than adequate substantiation.

And if "knowing" is considered to be the equivalent of sexual intercourse, then, yes, perhaps we have a problem. But I don't believe it, and this is why. Genesis 2 comes from a different and more ancient tradition than Genesis 1. While Genesis 2 contains a creation myth, the main emphasis of the J author seems not to be on the creation, but to other issues. Specifically, the J author seems intent on providing an explanation as to why snakes live forever (as was thought to be the case by ancient man) while man had knowledge instead. According to the Genesis story, although God intended that man should have the gift of life, the snake "stole" it, and in consequence, man had to settle for the less desirable gift of knowledge. By the way, how many of you really believe in a talking snake?

I think the temple priests who edited the Jewish Bible combined separate traditions which were not consistent. They did this in a rather transparent fashion (different names for the Deity, for example) because the inconsistency was not a problem for them, and they were intent on preserving both traditions. With these obvious differences in tone, style and syntax, however, it never ceases to amaze me that some very intelligent people still refuse to see the multiplicity of authorship, and insist that Genesis 2 is merely a restatement of

Genesis 1 (but filling in the details).

Don't you just hate it when somebody says you are totally wrong, but goes on to say that he does not want to discuss it further? Bernhard did that to me once :-)

I agree with this. While it is true that I said something to the effect that I thought the error was not a big thing, I was referring mainly to other errors that are, in my opinion, much greater than this one. (Why bother with this minor error when far greater errors can be found?)

I was not aware of that, Keith. But I don't think it matters. Regardless of the source, I think it is a valid distinction.

I disagree. I think that question was very cleverly framed.

E.C. said: If evidence comes to light that casts the entire cosmological big bang framework into doubt then so be it. In fact, it will be good for science. However, twisting the scriptures to match the evidence is contrived and serves nothing but a creationist agenda

Well said. I would suspect that if the author of Genesis 2, was to be reincarnated and discover the controversy surrounding his neat l

"So, to sum up, that's why I think any attempt to prove the existence of an anti-evil is ill-fated; the very notion of evil is morally posited only in relation to the primary assertion of "what is good". The good is itself the "anti-evil" and one must first start with assuming that it exists before one may assert that the evil [fundamentally the "not-good"] exists. Essentially, I see it as begging the question."

You present formidable arguments, and I am probably unqualified to answer. But I do not agree. I have met not one human being in all of my life, in any situation, facing any horror or turmoil (or even comfortable beyond reason) who does not recognize the presence of evil when it is manifest. In all honesty (I’d really like to know), have you? I have conversely met quite a few folks who do not believe that 'good,' or the 'anti-evil' exists.

I have also discovered in my experience evil to be highly intelligent, though it can play stupid. It is violent, insatiable, and conniving. It is entirely human.

The opposing point you stress is that if evil is human, its opposite must also be human. This is, I think, true to a limitation. The recognition by all our rational senses (whatever those may be) that evil must be opposed in a duality-based universe is subjective. Some people are more evil than others. The recognition of the "other" is human as much as evil is human. The "other" is something else.

I guess I'd better qualify this quick before naptime. I do hereby qualify this statement with the modifiers presented to me of late on this board, which argue that the existence of evil proves that evil does not exist. In this circumstance of viewpoint, I must assume that the presence of good proves that good does not exist, so there is no point to make.

Other than that, my statement stands.

That sort of reminds me of a sermon on the Devil I heard once when I was a kid. Now you have to agree that the Devil is evil, do you not? I must say it was a rather dreadful sermon, but I believed it. After all, I could not imagine the good pastor spinning a tale. Actually, he told several stories, two that I remember in particular.

Actually, as I recall, the good pastor had not himself personally been visited by the Devil, but he knew of several who had. One was a farmer in a prior church who had gone up into his hayloft, as was his habit, to pray--when the Devil appeared unto him. The farmer said the Devil seemed very nervous, twisting this way and that way, which, as the preacher pointed out, is what you would expect. If you knew your fate was eternal damnation in Hell fire and brimstone, would you not also be nervous? Anyway, as the farmer explained it, the Devil was reaching for him trying to get to him, but the farmer knew better than to try to fight the Devil alone, and instead called upon the Lord to intervene, and slowly, the Devil receded until he disappeared completely--while the farmer prayed a prayer of thanksgiving to God that God had forced the Devil to leave.

Also, a visiting evangelist had seen the Devil in that very church. He had been downstairs preparing his sermon for the revival meeting later that evening when the Devil appeared to him and tried to get to him. And it was only because the visiting evangelist called upon the name of the Lord that he had been saved from the clutches of the Devil.

Personally, I think if you believe in the Devil,

you have to believe in evil.

That sort of reminds me of a sermon on the Devil I heard once when I was a kid. Now you have to agree that the Devil is evil, do you not? I must say it was a rather dreadful sermon, but I believed it. - Cliff Beall

Then again, you probably also believed in Santa Claus and in the Easter Bunny.

I have met not one human being in all of my life, in any situation, facing any horror or turmoil (or even comfortable beyond reason) who does not recognize the presence of evil when it is manifest. - Joy Busey

Consider the recent massacre in Kosovo. To most of the world population, it was an evil act. To the Serbs, it was justified - not at all an evil act. There have been, and will be other situations like this one.

Russell Husted: I think Bernard Schopper was teasing when he wrote about the quips of creationists 100% and so on. I hope so :) - Marie M.

Actually not. And I apologize for the typo. It should have read:

Creationists - 99.99%

Religion is a lost cause to reality. For several thousand years the popular belief was great leaders must have God for a father and a virgin mother. All of the Pharoahs were sons of virgins and they worked at it so hard that the inbredding caused Epilepsy. The street people bums and prostitutes, life, in Rome was so difficult they were starving for some salvation. Some of them got together and made up the story about a noted Jewish Rabii. That was crucified a couple hundred years before they were able to find enough people to start their movement. Excepting the people living outside the city people of the heather, Heathens liked the status quo and did not need another god and definetly thought this life was adequate, were not intrested in another after death. About this same time in the mid east another bunch got uptight about Budha's Mother being a virgin visted by a god. To this day some live with the silly belief any woman that is a virgin can have a kid. The result of this belief in this day and age is Epilepsy Christianity and Budhism. Not all tragic. Religious fervor is sometimes a good thing for some people. Its a pretty lucritive business and occasionaly returns benfits to people that really need it. Not many religious zealots are really Scientist they seem to have a narrow focus of mentality. The problem is to a scientist the world is round. Most of the christians believed it was flat. More and more christians are starting to believe the world is round and know babies are not born from virgins. We're making progress as the Y2K approaches maybe by Y4K we'll be over theses silly beliefs and into the reality of time. You live, do what you can, you die, with luck you had a good life. Maybe someday your DNA will fall together and you'll do it all over again in another time.

Isn't rather a large stretch to assume that only the bizarre and deformed were fossilized from the days of Homo erectus (~one million years BC, and none since - the remains of erectus and sapiens have not found in the same strata as far as I know). Isn't it a little more likely they were random representatives of a separate species, very human-like to be sure, but not exactly like us?

The use of "micro" vs. "macro" evolution is restricted pretty much to creationists, but there's no real harm it, except this: why is it conceptually impossible for a successive series of microevolutionary events to result in macroevolution? I think that creationists have simply created artificial distinctions with little justification to make it easier for them to deny evolution on a large scale without providing proof that it cannot occur, and without appearing silly enough to deny the obvious evidence of animal breeding that it can. "Oh, yes", they can say, "microevolution isn't surprising, but macroevolution never happens!" Well, why does it never happen? Where is the scientific justification for making this claim? Answer - they give none.

Please provide a reference.

..."Oh, yes", they can say, "microevolution isn't surprising, but macroevolution never happens!" Well, why does it never happen? Where is the scientific justification for making this claim? Answer - they give none.-Leszek Rzepecki.

Even on breeding farms and scientific experiments with human intervention, no one has shown a clear defininite example, or especially in nature. No evidence for this.:)

Because, Marie, it takes longer. If it takes x years to accomplish a small breeding change, say from a parent species of finch to all the daughter species of the Galapagos, or the evolution of butterflies in Hawaii from a documented original introduction, or new species of wheat and cattle on breeding farms, then it will take much longer for such changes to become large enough for your "macro" evolution - longer than the lifetime of any scientist, and perhaps longer than the lifetime of our civilization, I don't know.

But why, Marie, deny from first principles that it can ever happen? Especially when there is so much fossil and genetic evidence that this is exactly what happened. Because that would falsify the Genesis story. I.e. they give no theoretical justification for this, except that they read it in a book.

Did my explanation of the extra chromosome in the chimpanzee satisfy you, btw? :)

You betcha sweetie! Of course, if you are only mostly dead, then you have that hope of revival. But since I've only known a couple of people who seem to operate in the "mostly dead" modality, I'm going to have to agree with you on this one. :-)

Catching up ...

Phew, over a hundred new messages.

Carl Nicoli: thanks for you kind words regarding our need for more representation here from eastern religions.

Bernhard: if you found a single biblical text clearly, directly, and unequivocally contradicting any branch of contemporary foundational science, what would that contradiction mean to your approach to biblical interpretation?

more ..

Carl Nicoli: again, thanks for your kind words regarding eastern religions. Please know I don't advance my bias as any normative claim. Buddhism, particularly Tantric Buddhism, is morosely vague, expressly admits it, and tries to remedy its vagaries by long periods of personal mentorship. Other traditions of Buddhism, including Theraveda and Mahayana, are far more scholastic, text bound, even philosophical, but they still love logical paradox (koans), for which I have little use, except as humor. For social ethics, I argue in favor of ethical rationalism.

Rosemary: I'm not a sprite! I'm a Pepper! Sheesh. I'm not going to pounce on you; we just disagree on some things :). I don't pounce on Kiwis. I have an in-law who is half Maori; most stunningly beautiful, but funny accent :))). They're in New Zealand now. I'm still learning; I'll save my pounces for Matt and Joy, they need ‘em!

Erratum:

I am a friggin idiot. This is just a simple Wien's Law relationship to calculate the wavelength corresponding to Planck blackbody curve peak:

wavelength=hc/4.965kT = 2.898x10E-3/T

Visible light ranges from 400nm (violet) -700nm (red) in wavelength

Consequently, the corresponding temperature range for which visisible light may be emitted as the cosmic background radiation is

4140K-7285K

not the 250K-6000K. What was I thinking? It serves me right for conjuring information from rote memory.

...if you found a single biblical text clearly, directly, and unequivocally contradicting any branch of contemporary foundational science, what would that contradiction mean to your approach to biblical interpretation? - Jim Rapp

Olber's Paradox:

At the beginning of the last century, the german Astronomer Olbers posed the following question: "Why is the night sky dark?".

The common response is that there are not enough stars in the sky and therefore there are gaps between the stars. In reality, there are enough stars to fill the sky and actually their total light would be sufficiently intense to burn Earth to a crisp.

If every star radiates energy Eo per unit time and if the Universe is homogeneous and infinite (just an assumption - not necessarily fact), one can find the intensity of light incident on Earth's surface. For one star located at distance r:

E=(Eo/4 pi r^2) pi R^2 (where R is Earth's radius).

Now the number of stars in a spherical shell centered on Earth, with radius r and thick delta r is 4 pi r^2 rho delta r, where rho is the mean denisty of stars in space. Therefore the total light received by the Earth from this shell is

delta E=4 pi r^2 delta r rho E = Eo rho pi R^2 delta r.

If the number of shells is infinite then the radiant flux incident on Earth's surface is infinite.. Of course the calculation does not take into account that some stars may obscure others thus lowering the incident flux to that roughly equivalent to the surface of the Sun i.e. the night time sky would be as bright as the Sun's surface.

The result contradicts our experience. Can anyone tell me why?

Rosemary,

I completely agree with Russell that "whale" is an awful translation. I would opt for "sea serpent". The Hebrew tanniyn. Cognates occur in Arabic, Aramaic (including Syriac, I believe) and Ethiopic. It is without question a creature of the sea. In Isaiah 51:9 the word appears in a parallelism with Rahab, both as personifications of primordial chaos. Rahab is the proper name of such a supernatural sea creature, as is everyone's favorite Chaos-Monster, Leviathan. Both Rahab and Leviathan share not only traits with one another, but with other chaos-monsters from ancient near Eastern literature, especially with the Sea Dragon ("Lotan"--the word is a Canaanite cognate of the Hebrew Leviathan) who alternates with Prince Sea/ Judge River as chaos embodied in a water entity fighting to destroy the creation of the gods in the Baal Cycle. The most famous and important supernatural sea serpent is no doubt the Babylonian goddess/ serpent Tiamat (an Akkadian cognate with the Biblical "tehom" of Genesis 1:2, often translated "deep"), who does battle with the god Marduk; from Tiamat's corpse Marduk fashions the world. The Sea and/or sea serpents (the tanniyn of Genesis) are important concepts in many cultures of the ancient near East. (Notice in Genesis, water is never created; it exists primordially along with God who exercises dominion over it--his spirit blows over the waters). I think to associate tanniyn with any actual, non-supernatural creature is an error.

Honestly, the Hebrew of Job is beyond me. It's as difficult as anything in the Bible. The word generally taken as hippo is Behemoth, which has come directly into English as a word in its own right. Morph

Rosemary,

continued...

Morphologically, it is the plural of the feminine noun behemah, "cattle." As such, the Septuagint tranlsates the verse as:

in English: "But now look at the wild beasts with you; they eat grass like oxen."

The Hebrew reads: "Look, now! Behemoth, whom I made with you ("with you" is probably overly literal; both the NRSV and the JPS Tanakh translate the word as "as I did you"), he/it eats grass like an ox." The verb in Hebrew makes it clear that, although Behemoth is technically a plural (as the Septuagint translators chose to understand it) the author of Job is using the term to refer to a single entity. The term is, I think, fairly obtuse and the author's precise intent is lost beyond retrieval. James L. Crenshaw, in his annotation to the NRSV text, offers this note on Behemoth:

On questions like this, my first stop is usually the Anchor Bible Dictionary. A truly indespensible tool; I'm sure it must have an entry, including bibliography, on Behemoth.

Not by then. But I did believe in Rock and Roll.

I would have considered this skeleton to be a "fossil." Is it?

What's a fossil? It's all in a name! (Latin fossilis=dug up) *LOL* Well, any bone buried in sediment is going to undergo a certain rate of mineral replacement dependent on its environment. So, older fossils will have their entire organic content replaced, younger ones will have partial replacement. So if some young fossil turns out to still have some organic component, it's not a surprise. I think that scientists who claim to have Neanderthal DNA have a lot to prove. I haven't read these particular papers, so I'm in no position to judge - they say their DNA sequences prove Neanderthals are not on the direct human line, and that is consistent with mitochondrial Eve 200,000 years ago.

So if a "fossil" is anything dug up, then some recent ones might contain DNA, older ones won't. It depends on how much time it's had to undergo mineralization. Certainly, Homo erectus fossils are way too old for DNA characterization, unfortunately. At least as far as I know :)

The Jurassic Park scenario? Mosquito stings an unfortunate Homo Erectus and quickly thereafter flies into tree sap before the blood is broken down in the insect's digestive tract. Thus, you have a pristine sample trapped in amber.

Far fetched but not impossible

While I wholly enjoyed the Jurassic Park movies, I found their premise scientifically wholly improbable :) Certainly, real-life attempts to isolate such DNA have been dubious in the extreme, and have not met with acceptance in the scientific community. Yet.

There are considerable problems with contamination with PCR technology, and of course, missing DNA is not easily replaced. That being said, knowledge in the future will exceed out own, so what we find impossible now may become commonplace then. More power to them, if so. I'd love to see them create a Neanderthal, Homo erectus, or dinosaur. The questions we could ask would be invaluable.

I think it is view with which I find myself most comfortable

I would have to say the result must be inaccurate. The probable cause is invalid assumptions. For one thing. We see stars as points of light. A point takes up no space and fills no area. I ask these questions: how many points exist in one square centimeter of area? Is the number more than all the stars in the universe?

At least, that is the way it appears to me.

Once we recognise that "species" provide convieniant observations in a single slice of time but, also understand that evolution operates as a process flowing through time, we begin to get a more meaningfull view of the biosphere.

Single species are no more significant to life in the long run that an individual flash of your cursor is to the message you write in response to me here.

Sorry you consider a belief in a Creator, who created the universe and all it's scientific laws, the same as UFOology.

I don't think a chimp is all that similar to man, I think the 98% is pre-mature and as genetics progresses, our knowledge of the true facts will emmerge, regarding ancestry.:)

I know I brought up the creation-scientists, but as I agree with alot of what they say, I don't agree with everything they say either. I think science, ie physics, and the study of our earth from space, etc shows an older earth and universe than 6000 years. And in Genesis the account has four periods of undetermined time spans ;before the sun and moon were created, to even make a 24 day as we know it now.

On the right track. A homogeneous and infinite universe implies the following:

(1) The density of stars (rho) as well as the energy they emit per unit time are quantities constant in space.

(2) Space is Euclidean or hyperbolic and therefore infinite.

(3) The average value of energy emitted, Eo, by the stars is constant in time

(4) The universe is static (not expanding).

Of these assumptions, which is the most likely to be incorrect? Rank in order.

If the number of stars is infinite then the number of points existing in one square centimeter is infinite. In actuality, even the farthest objects observed do subtend minute patches of the night sky. Stars are not zero-dimensional points in the mathematical sense.

Marie at Marie M. 1/20/99 10:19pm: hahaha. Hey, Marie! Quit calling us monkeys (Mighty Joe Young) just because we had a common ancestor! Very funny Marie. Marie, haven't you seen the Shroud of Turin? It has an imprint of Jesus, with gill slits! -Jim Rapp # 633.

I'm not the one who believes that myth.:)

Also I tried to come up with a come back on the comment about my Savior. I'll just be blunt: I find it offensive.:(

I completely agree. The division by the creationists of "micro" vs. "macro" evolution is specious. It implies a complete - and deliberate - misunderstanding of evolutionary theory.

Leszek, as on the link for anthropolgy , also used the terms micro/macro evolution. I don't think it's just a creationist term.

I agree the terms are deceiving. I think the term for microevolution, should be called something else, to separate it from the total evolutionary theory. Micro-evolution can be proved naturally and genetically.

The common response is that there are not enough stars in the sky and therefore there are gaps between the stars. In reality, there are enough stars to fill the sky and actually their total light would be sufficiently intense to burn Earth to a crisp. - E.C.

Nonsense.

What you are implying is that the observed universe has a boundary. Boundaries are dangerous when you examine cosmology. Since no reference point is special in the cosmos and the laws os physics apply everywhere this side of an event horizon then relative to us these distant galaxies would materialize out of nothing (i.e. their light may just be reaching us as to appear that mass conservation had been violated) while another vantage point may have already detected the newly visible galaxy. Thus in this scenario there are special points of reference, afterall, which is in violation of the apriori supposition that there are none.

An observed universe with a finite number of stars still runs into problems. For the sake of argument, suppose that this finite universe is closed without boundaries. The light from distant galaxies moves forever along a geodesic in the closed universe passing an infinite number of times through the position of the observer. If the distance to a galaxy is z lightyears and the time it takes the light to go once around the universe is T, we receive not only the light emitted by the galaxy z years ago, but also the light emitted z+T years ago, and z+2T years ago,.... Thus the total amount of light we receive from all the galaxies is of the same order of the magnitude as the amount of light we receive in an infinite universe.

Marie, I can not possibly answer all of the charges contained in the page to which you supplied a link. But I will, in a small way, attempt to refute the charges with respect to Potassium-Argon and Argon-Argon dating. Please click the following link:

Skip down to the very bottom of the page and click: "A Tutorial on the 40Ar/39Ar Step-Heating Dating Technique."

Scan this document, and compare it to the page to which you supplied a link. If you think about it, I think you will see a significant difference. Can you tell me what it is?

Olber's paradox resolved:

(1) The density of stars (rho) as well as the energy they emit per unit time are quantities constant in space.

Although a minute anisotropy does exist, the distribution of galaxies and stars is relatively uniform. This assumption is essential

(2) Space is Euclidean or hyperbolic and therefore infinite.

It doesn't matter if the universe is infinite or finite and unbounded. This assumption need not be dropped

(3) The average value of energy emitted, Eo, by the stars is constant in time

This assumption is flat out wrong. Stars do not last forever. Every star is is born, evolves and dies within a finite number of years. Even if we assume that dead stars contrbute to the creation of new stars, the life of the universe is still not infinite. It must be less than the time requiredc for the matter in the universe to be converted into eneryg, i.e.

Tmax=Mc^2/Eo

where M is the average mass of each star. This means that we receive light from stars only as far as Tmax ligh years from us therefore the total radiant energy of the universe is finite. Steady state theorist attempt to circumvent (3) by arguing that matter is continuously being created out of nothing. If this were the case, the universe would be eternal in the past and the future, and Tmax would be infinite.

(4) The universe is static (not expanding).

If the universe is not static, but continuously expanding, the ligh received from the most distant stars would be much less than if the same stars were not moving. Thus the total light is small even though the universe may be infinite and eternal.

Therefore, one can conclude that the universe is either of finite age and/or expanding without the creation of new matter. Current cosmological theories favors both a finite age and expanding universe.

It is interesting how many syllogisms one can make from one apparently insignificant observation made by a long dead astronomer.

...What you are implying is that the observed universe has a boundary. - E.C.

Not at all.

Lost is sort of standard operating proceedure on this board, isn’t it Jim? §:o) I think you are confusing points, which I have no doubt failed to make clearly enough. That’s what I get for trying to make them all at the same time, I guess, relatively speaking. The bell curve example was used to illustrate my point that morality is a product of moral, ethical or legal codes invented by humans for societal-civilizational purposes.

In my experience of people, particularly young children, I have learned that some humans tend to more readily understand and accept ‘rules’ than others. Thus the bell curve. The fact that morality isn’t inherited means we’ve got no "Moral Gene" in the programming code. The fact that rules are necessary demonstrates our innate tendency to break them. That might be inherited, but not from our animal nature.

Aberrational behavior in animals is rare, most often the product of injury or disease. A lion is not evil for eating a gazelle, because eating gazelles is what lions do. That is their nature. A lion eating another lion would be an aberration. It strongly appears that it is human nature to hate, steal, murder, covet, etc. Also evident is the fact that some humans are more prone to do evil than others.

Evil is an absolute in that it exists, is active in all ranges of human endeavor, and present to some extent in all humans. We cannot eradicate it, because it is part of us. Inseparable from us. There is no cure on a species-wide scale, short of finding and eradicating some "Evil Gene" strangely stuck on our DNA. I think it’s a lot more fundamental than that.

"Personally, I think if you believe in the Devil, you have to believe in evil." - That’s awfully logical, Cliff. I don’t believe in the devil as existing outside of ourselves, though it may ‘appear’ in psychological projection that way if you’re particularly prone to ‘appearances.’ A lot of people have a name for evil, and all of them fit the personality of evil. The names project evil outside of ourselves.

Note the ID God gave to Moses. "I Am." This is a terrific name which internalizes the ‘other’ if you say it, think it, believe it enough. It’s still a projection, because I perceive this dichotomy of good and evil as entirely backwards. But then, I’ve already admitted I’m dyslexic... §:o)

I know. Your reasoning is also valid after a second look. Strike what I said concerning point of references. Two mistakes on two consequetive days is too much to take. I'm going to bed.

I disagree with you gentlemen. I assume you are correct that the terminology is a creationist invention, but if so, I think it does not matter. I think these are valid concepts. I think that both creationists and evolutionist should agree that:

Microevolution represents a change in gene frequencies of a population without speciation (the origin of a new species). This would include all the variations of domestic cats, for example.

Macroevolution involves sufficient genetic diversion such that two previously interbreeding populations can no longer successfully breed. An example of macroevolution would be the lion and the tiger. Actually, lions and tigers have been breed in captivity, but their offspring is sterile, much as the offspring of a donkey and a horse is sterile.

Often, macroevolution involves changes in the number of chromosomes. But this is not always the case: some animals which have the same number of chromosomes are not able to breed, and some animals having different numbers of chromosomes have been observed to successfully breed and produce fertile offspring.

Anyway, creationists will make their arguments the way they prefer to make them regardless what you say. (They think they have free speech.)

A dog can be made vicious by a vicious trainer, but dogs are not evil. A dog using hunting skills to attack humans on command does not seem evil to the dog, and the dog cannot be named ‘evil’ because it has been trained to kill. Where is the evil here if the command to kill is murder? Answer: in the commander, not the dog.

Humans can be led toward evil because they tend toward evil. Where is the evil when the command to kill is given? Answer: Relatively attributable to all.

Rubbish. If someone trains a dog to kill, and gives the command the dog is trained to obey, how does this make me evil? I do not believe in the Devil either inside or outside man. The concept of the Devil was an invention. (However, I guess the fact that man was capable of conceiving of such an evil thing as the Devil may be an indication that evil does truly exist in man. :-)

Woh! Some of my favourite and most rational posters.

Cliff, I think the fact that the scientists are interested in the ethical implications might interest you.

I would argue that scientists who are not all ready programed to accept an "old religion" must develop a new one and it will be based on what they know best. Namely Science.

I would further argue that there exists a social hierarchy that runs from Art to Math to Science to Engineering to Technical to Production that provides a way of moving from the most abstract to the most real.

It is in this way that we most efficiently turn our dreams into reality.

Aberrational behavior in animals is rare, most often the product of injury or disease. - Joy Busey

Not necessarily. Malicious behavior has been observed in certain species of animals when it comes to establishing a position in a group's hierarchy, for example.

Humans can be led toward evil because they tend toward evil. - Joy Busey

I disagree. I believe man is intrinsically good, because because being good provides one with the satisfaction derived from the performance of one's moral duty, or from the sense of achievement and self-esteem that is often being derived from creative work. Furthermore, the Biblical saying: "Do to others, as you wish others do to you," is a valid, unviversally accepted concept.

Marie

I'm sorry I offended you. I apologize.

Usually, this is called variation.

Why stick "macro"in front of it, when plain "evolution" suffices? Anyway, I'm not sure the creationists would describe the lion/tiger species as examples of "macroevolution" even on their own terms. They're still of a "kind" or type, i.e. cats. I think, I could be wrong, that they would want to look on this as "microevolution".

If that's right, the creationist concepts of macro and micro have no corresponding concepts in evolutionary science that I know of. They are specifically designed to frame the debate in such terms that large changes can be decried as impossible, whereas small changes can be accepted.

I guess we all tend to be either "splitters" or "lumpers" in terms of concepts and phenomena. I tend to lump all genetic change together, while recognising that very small changes result only in variation, while larger changes result in speciation. The dividing line between these is not always easy to draw, and to be honest, I'm not sure how creationists would go about it in anycase. Their concept of "kind" has no strict taxonomical equivalent, as sometimes kinds are separated at species level, or at family level, or phyletic level, etc., and sometimes even at purely functional level (such as when bats are lumped in with the fowl of the air). This fudging is necessary to keep to the literal word of the bible.

We shall see if they make any astounding discoveries. Seems to me that they are hedging the bet by saying life is more complex than they expected with different genes doing different things for different organisms. I am not sure I am surprised by that, however. Here is why:

As a programmer, I use as much code from my existing programs as I can. It just makes sense to save the time and energy to re-create it. And as a designer, when designing a new mechanism, I try to use as many existing parts from existing mechanisms as I can. I know the properties of those parts and how they can be used to aid in the operation of the new mechanism. And, again, it saves me time and energy to use that which is already available.

But life is not like that. Organisms are not concerned with interchangeability of parts and the use of existing parts from other organisms. Furthermore, it appears that there is never the intent of creating a new design anyway. The cells of existing organisms just randomly mutate. Sometimes the mutation tends to greater complexity and sometimes it tends to reduced complexity. Sometimes it is found to be of benefit and sometimes not of benefit. Sometimes, it is of benefit in one respect but causes a problem in another respect. Sometimes, a benefit is great enough to be retained in the offspring of the organism even with the problem. However, if there is a problem, it is likely to be solved by the next available favorable mutation of a gene, whether it is a mutation of the original gene or a mutation of another gene.

Given this, I don't think it should be surprising that different genes handle different things in different organisms. I also do not think it should surprise that many genes do absolutely nothing at all.

Actually, I suspect this interest is not much more than a CYA operation. I doubt if Venter and his crew really care all that much about the ethics of what they are doing. Left up to their own devices, I suspect that they would plow straight ahead without the slightest thought to ethics. But they are smart enough to have PR people on their staff to remind them when they need to appeal for "ethical guidance." (I must confess, however, that it is sometimes very easy to become so interested in something as to shut out any ethical considerations, and if I were in their shoes, I think I might need to be reminded also.)

Neat word for it, huh?

On what basis? That the lion and tiger "look" similar? I think the creationist who says that in a debate with me would be in trouble because my very next question would be whether the same would apply with respect to the divergence of a chimpanzee and a gorilla? The chimp and the gorilla likewise "look" similar and have about the same amount of divergence as a lion and a tiger. Is the divergence of a chimpanzee and a gorilla likewise "microevolution"?

I think I may have said that wrong. I suspect that the divergence of the chimp and gorilla is slightly greater than that of the lion and the tiger. And I should have said, "The chimp and the gorilla likewise 'look' similar and have only slightly greater divergence than the lion and the tiger."

(This slight difference in divergence is of no real consequence. In order to take advantage of the difference, the Creationist would have to accept the concept of "divergence." I think the terms "microevolution" and "macroevolution" are defining terms that can not possibly be helpful to the creationist point of view when examined closely.)

Well of course there are some CYA types. And some that would not consider the implications of their work.

I have known some though who quit doing weapons research when it became obvious what their work would be used for.

Carl, I think most people are CYA types after they get a good dose of what can happen if they don't pay attention. Scientists have been rather beat up on lately for neglecting ethical considerations and I think it is natural for them to want to avoid a repeat. So they ask for a review up front.

Nothing wrong with that, it seems to me, but it is still CYA.

You'd better ask the creationists on this board... I don't accept their terminology, and I'm surely not going to try and explain it - I don't even understand it! :)

I believe you misread my comments. I said the commander alone is evil if the dog kills on command, not the dog. You are guilty of evil if you commit evil, whether commanded or not. Therein lies the relativity factor.

Why would the societally-based benefits of following the rules (satisfaction, self-esteem, achievement) indicate that man is intrinsically ‘good’ to have perceived the necessity for such rules? All this indicates is that the perception is a ‘good’ thing. That can be attributed to the empirical observation of the harm resulting from people’s tendencies to break the rules that ‘ought’ to be there. This is a purely civilizational concept. And if we’re so ‘good,’ where does evil come from? ...Oh yeah. You’re the one who believes evil doesn’t exist. Sorry! §:o)

I’ve been so stumped by finding that there are people who honestly (?) believe evil doesn’t exist because it is evident, that I may have missed the underlying thread on that. To tell the honest truth, I had never before encountered such an absurdity, but I’ve never hung around much with the radical right of the evolution arena either. Probably explains it. §:o)

While Genesis 1 and 2 may well be predicated on a mythological base of reference, I also recognize the psychological underpinnings of mythology. ‘Truth’ is there, though the truth it contains is not a good roadmap for science. My field is/was physics, so I understand better the quest for perfect symmetry than the quest for animal origins and its conflict with Biblical interpretations.

To me, there is Truth in the cause which effected the ‘fall’ into manifest creation. The ‘fall’ from perfect symmetry. That cause is identified in Genesis to be the choice to partake of duality, the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Because the story identifies Cain as the builder of cities, the animal evolution of humankind must have reached a significant level prior to the ‘fall’ of the special creation. Figuring at least 6,000 years of crossing the special creation with the human population of the planet, I thought everyone by now must possess the Knowledge of Good and Evil. I now admit I may be in error on this.

Of course evil doesn't exist as an entity... evil is a consequence of an action, just like good, and not a force determining actions. We tend to reify concepts like this because that makes them easier to grasp. Actions resulting in evil arise from motivations such as greed, jealousy, anger, etc., but these are just human emotions, they aren't created by an "evil force". Remove human beings from the equation, and good and evil will disappear... they are purely human philosophical constructs designed to help us make our way in life without causing too much friction with our neighbors. They aren't independent forces.

And if we’re so ‘good,’ where does evil come from? ...Oh yeah. You’re the one who believes evil doesn’t exist. - Joy Busey

I never said that evil doesn't exist. I said that the concept of "evil" is in the eye of the beholder.

The fact that this discourse is occurring at all does cast the supposedly self evident nature of evil as you define it into doubt.

Bernhard has applied the relativity bell curve to Leszek’s assertion of the non-existence of independent forces. You guys aren’t working together, are you? §:o)

Bernhard, I did note that you do display some point of reference from which to judge that there is evil. That’s a very good start! As to whether it’s independent of human nature, I have already established my viewpoint that it does not exist apart from humanity. Humans are evil. Humans can corrupt nature, but nature is not evil. We are something quite different than the native fauna, though we share the form and functions.

And to Leszek, all I can say is that if humanity were removed from the equation, who’d bother to look for the answers?

Re Matt Neujhar 1/22/99, 5:37:28pm (#602)

re: Russell Husted 1/22/99 12:52am

He who had made ALL the animals...etc, now brought them to be named which, in the scripture, and Hebrew beliefs, is equivalent to "knowing" them...

This is patently false. Where is the evidence that Israelites prior to, say, the Seleucid Empire, held this belief? The name-knowledge correlation is a Greek idea, so far as I know. Fo you have any Hebrew evidence for this?

Well, Matt, a discussion with you is definitely a debate. A bit like talking to someone from the Jesus Seminar. I used the "" around "knowing" looking for some license, only suggesting an idea but not wanting to get into the essay that "knowing" represents. But, quite fairly from your perspective, you give none. Though it's a minor point in a much broader thesis, and an aside at that (its actually not in the book itself - I just raised it here in discussion) you certainly are entitled to find it grounds to decide the whole thing is "shaky". Some folks, you'll notice, are able to use the fact that the Old Testament, given to a people in at least 1500 BC, who were more concerned with leeks and onions than slide-rules (that dates me, huh?) and engineering handbooks, failed to describe a temple artifact in less than two decimal accuracy, to satisfy themselves. Nonetheless. Before I get any further into semantic troubles with you, let me put the burden of the semantics back on you. Though I've studied some philosophy and metaphysics, myself, and I think I know what you are referring to in the Greek idea of "name-knowledge correlation", you make it perfectly clear, OK? Give me a definition and small exposition... maybe a reference or two, if it's relevant.

As for what I mean, the best way (though it may not be in your case - people think in different ways) I ca

Matt Neujhar cont...

I can think of is to lead you through some of the things that brought me to my conclusions. Now first, I had put the idea forth as only a suggestion, not something I know. In fact, who does know exactly what went on in that verse (incident)? But let me just pose a few questions for you to think about. They're indicative of the path I've followed. First: what is the actual connotative field of the Hebrew word at issue (kaw-raw, Strong's #7122). I think, to do a good job in choosing a narrower meaning from the field, you should look at the result of Adam's "kaw-raw-ing" -- the "shem" (#8034). And, take into account God's seeming motive(s) and role, while this was going on. God sort of sat back and "ra-ah-ed" (# 7200), didn't He? Now, we also know that there is a strong implication both before and after the action of "naming"(verses 2:18 & 20), that God seemed to be having Adam look for an appropriate mate in fact, right? Do you think that the Creator All High God was either uncertain as to what to call these animals, or needed Adam to name them, or unable to look into the future a bit and know the results of the exercise, or was surprised that Adam found no "suitable mate"?

OK. A few more questions. Why is it God has some 250 names, and that reverent Jews never use the one true, "essence" name? Why is it the Torah has been so accurately preserved through 3 ½ millennia? Is it the belief that in every "jot and tittle" lies the solidity of the creation? Why is it that the Scriptures teach that God "spoke" each detail into creation? Why is it Jesus, God's physical incarnation among men, is called "The Word"? Why is it that the names of the characters throughout the history recorded in the Bible have names that are both prophetic (about their roles to come) and characters? Is it merely a literary device? If you are of the Jesus Seminar persuasion, of course you'll say yes. But if you believe (or temporarily allow) the Bible

As I define what, E.C.? I haven’t gotten that far yet. We encountered the black hole on the opening subject, which was whether or not evil exists. I haven’t done any defining, except to state my theory that it resides in humans rather than outside of humans.

Never mind. I can see this is going nowhere, for the reasons I have previously posted. I am now forced to wonder about what happened to this board. The topic was "Science and Religion," if I remember how to read, and it suddenly became the evolution board. Which explains why nobody’s posting on the evolution board, I guess. Time for CNN’s webmeisters to shuffle the cards again...

Matt Neujhar concluded:

the Bible is true, and a history, then the logic is interesting. In fact, why is it that places of historic content get names that designate the "knowledge" one should have about them? Why is it God, Himself, would not reveal His "real" name in His early encounters, and the process of choosing out the Israeli people? Sure woulda been easier to recruit followers, like all the other gods of the world do.

BTW, the title of the book probably won't thrill you, because its aimed at a different audience than you (I'm working on a "higher level treatise): "Hey Mom, What About Dinosaurs?"

It will be available to you on line soon.

I am a fish out of water on this issue so to speak (evolutionary hint by the way), but isn't the "essence" name YWHW?

Marie M

Just a note about all this talk about when light appeared, etc, in the universe, and in the creation account. The folks who are doing all the talking are not talking with certain knowledge of the Scripture. What E.C. keeps putting out, about the Big Bang = some 100 K's of years, etc, and the various background (if we could properly characterize a "background" at that time) has nothing to do with the scriptural account. Genesis 1:1 says God created ALL. Period. The heavens and the earth. That's essentially the end of that chapter. Genesis 1:2 now shifts POV to earth surface. A new chapter. Or maybe Genesis 1:1 was a mere preface.

Now, the next verse in the "light debate" is Genesis 1:3. Its usually, loosely translated "God said let there be light." It does not say He created light here, just that He said "Let there be" or, closer yet, "let there appear light" – on the surface of the earth. We might assume, but one assumes only at the risk of error, it suddenly appeared, like turning on the switch. It only says He declared it shall happen, and that it did happen in due order. There are 3 verbs translated with various connotations of "create" in this short account, Genesis 1 & 2, and this one has the least sense of same. It is more in line with a natural, inevitable, process -- by reason of God's design of the natural laws and His ability to use them. And is not contradicted by anything they've argued. They just don't know their "enemy". They can argue down the Christian (who also doesn't know the full truth of what the Bible said), but they haven't dealt with the Scriptures. Just their own ideas of them.

PS I figured Bernhard was "teasing", but he really does seem to consider "creationists" as another, inferior race...

Okay, I shall try to explain. My reasoning is as follows:

1. Creationists agree that microevolution occurs, but say that macroevolution does not.

2. But if the genetic divergence of the lion and tiger is considered microevolution, as you suggested creationists will want to stipulate, then the genetic divergence of the chimpanzee and the gorilla must likewise be considered microevolution. (Roughly, a comparable amount of divergence.)

3. But if the genetic divergence between the chimpanzee and the gorilla is considered microevolution, which the creationist agrees does occur, then the question arises: what about the genetic divergence between the chimpanzee and the human? After all, genetically, the chimpanzee is at least as close to a human than to a gorilla.

See the problem? I would therefore strongly suspect that creationists will wish to stipulate that the genetic diversion of the lion and tiger should be considered macroevolution. But I guess we can ask:

Any Creationists out there in messageboard land want to argue with me about what is microevolution and what is macroevolution? I say the lion and tiger is an example of macroevolution. What do you say?

You read it here first

You probaby meant species. There are no inferior races.

Cliff Beall - Saturday, 01/23/99(#617)

Russell Husted said: Now the problem for you here, is that you should understand that that is a parenthetical reminder...ie that He who had made ALL the animals...etc, now brought them to be named which, in the scripture, and Hebrew beliefs, is equivalent to "knowing" them...

And if "knowing" is considered to be the equivalent of sexual intercourse,

Good Grief, Cliff... I surely intended no such meaning... See my recent post to Matt, on that... I didn't realize what a poor choice of language I'd committed!

As to your "Genesis 2 comes from a different and more ancient tradition than Genesis 1." How do you know that? That's a typical outsider, nonbeliever analysis. The Jewish custodians certainly do not agree. And , then, about your, " While Genesis 2 contains a creation myth, the main emphasis of the J author seems not to be on the creation, but to other issues." That's for sure. But your own answer, "providing an explanation as to why snakes live forever" is rather off the wall (what professor teaches that one?) (And the snake only comes in Genesis 3, you know). The chapter is another change in POV. Creation is being recounted (with no deviation in the details of Genesis 1) with the focus now on mankind. Now our place and role are being spelled out. And finally, I trust you are only being "foolin' aroun'" when you ask "By the way, how many of you really believe in a talking snake?" I saw that line in a James Garner movie, btw. The snake spoke not, but the spirit that possessed it did. Though, of course, lotsa folks don't believe in such "spirit possession". Lotsa the same, btw, believe in UFOs, spirit channeling, the spirit religions of native Americans, etc. No one ever said we gotta be consistent.

Now this next quote really would take a book or two, or half dozen profe

Cliff Beall

or half dozen professors to deal with all the stuff you dumped into it as if fact: "the temple priests who edited the Jewish Bible combined separate traditions which were not consistent. They did this in a rather transparent fashion (different names for the Deity, for example) because the inconsistency was not a problem for them, and they were intent on preserving both traditions.

The temple priests would have been – undone – had they edited the Bible. The Torah was believed so sacred and inviolable that a single copying error – one single penstroke – required destruction, not correction, of the scroll. Because they believed that to change a word (by which words the universe was created) would change the creation. The Dead Sea Scrolls are proving how well that has preserved the text through the centuries. And you need to study the issues about "names" and the names in/of the Diety. And how on earth, within their unique belief system about this being the ONE TRUE God, could they have decided to "preserve" more than one tradition. You've just gotta know more about it from the inside, not from the outside. And I know, I'll not be able to help there, at all. All I'm able to do is stay on one small focus... the true content of the creation account.

E.C. - Monday, 01/25/99(#689)

Russell Husted 1/24/99 11:03pm

PS I figured Bernhard was "teasing", but he really does seem to consider "creationists" as another, inferior race...

You probaby meant species. There are no inferior races.

Ah yes, my friend. I admire your politically correct assessment, but the problem is, we had a 100% genetic match with H. sapiens, so it had to be same species!!! Ultimately, I believe we have a terrible problem. Even "races" are populations with recognizabe and definable different genomes, that is, they are not 100%ers. In fact, everyone of us flunks the Bernhard purity test!!! But I fully agree with your statement of conclusion... there are no inferior races. Just different. Some do fly better than others, though, as far as I can see!

Sorry EC! I read it in Thursday's afternoon paper, and then on Friday evening, Falwell was on the Rivera show. Although the topic was the Clinton Senate hearings, he did go into it a bit. It is pretty much his own ideology as to who and why this "anti-Christ" is Jewish.

However, there has been little said on it since then. At least as far as I can tell. Just as well, because Falwell is more the charlatan than a real preacher, IMHO!

I have also heard more than one biblical scholar relate that the Genesis books are from two different sources. If I remember right, it was the different writing styles that played a major role in that determination, among other things.

Where do you find those, E.C. That was delightful!

You said: "Humans can be led toward evil because they tend toward evil. Where is the evil when the command to kill is given? Answer: Relatively attributable to all."

Joy, when you say "attributable to all," I assume you mean "all." I know of no reason to accept a "relativity factor" whatever that means. As I understand it, you are trying to make the case that evil, of itself, exists--like in a vacuum. What does your "relativity factor" have to do with that? And if I accept your relativity factor, exactly what have I accepted?

I guess I am surprised that you do not believe in the Devil. I though most "fundamentalists" believe in the "debbil." Your concept of evil sure sounds pretty fundamentalistic to me.

Being accused of being a member of the radical right of anything certainly feels funny. I do not remember being accused of being right wing before. I generally see myself as a middle of the roader: an Eisenhower republican.

I don't believe in the "fall." Do you also believe in talking snakes?

Oh, so that is what you believe? Heck, as near as I can tell, the only difference between you and Jerry Falwell is that he believes in the Devil and that man is evil due to the influence of the Devil. You, on the other hand, believe man is evil without the influence of the Devil.

I certainly suspect you are in error.

Humans are part of nature. We are no different than the "native fauna," and you are correct that we do share the "form and functions."

Yeah. Something fun to read! I like it!

If you demand acquiesence to your premise before proceeing to your definitions, I am afraid you may never get there. It certainly doesn't sound right to me, but if you make an argument, I will, for one, at least, read it. I will not promise more than that, but I suggest you make your argument, anyway.

I don't know why you would say that, Joy. It seems to me that your "evil" argument has dominated the board of late. I would also note that your argument seems to have no relationship to science at all. What "science" do you think should be allowed on the "Science and Religion" board?

I would suspect that that is the nature of folk traditions having many authors.

I think I heard something like that when I was a kid. Something about reading the scripture "in the spirit." Is that what you mean?

Russell, who specifically are you saying is my "enemy" that I "don't know"?

That is nothing new, E.C. I heard that stuff when I was a kid forty some years ago. That is nothing new.

Joy,

I wonder if you could help me understand what you mean by duality. You keep using this expression, but not in a way that makes clear to me quite where you're coming from. Perhaps it would help if I stated that the problem of evil has always been .. just that, a problem for me. I am a Christian, I believe in a Creator, I believe that He created this world I live in and the Universe beyond it. He made it up. In other words, as a storyteller makes up his story or an artist paints a picture, so God created everything I know, including little old me. I'm that stick like person somewhere over there by the beach. And if the artist decided to paint over me, or just erase me, then I have no "rights" in the matter. That's where I stand and everything I struggle with is from that position. Now if there is a 'dual' anything, I need to know if you are talking about two gods, one good and one bad, or are you saying that one God created both good and evil and that is the 'dual' you are talking about? It was quite obvious when you were talking about an 'anti-evil' that your dyslexia is in fact a problem for me in trying to understand you because those of us without that burden would simply talk about 'good' or God and not use the expression 'anti-evil' because it doesn't give a straightforward explanation.

I personally only know of one other person who believes what you seem to be saying here .. namely that humans

Joy continued ..

I personally only know of one other person who believes what you seem to be saying here .. namely that humans [non special creation] were around on earth, and then along came God and made His 'special creation' who also happen to be human in appearance and the two mixed together. It is certainly not what the Bible tells us, but you must know that. However it raises huge problems as well. At worst it could lead to the sort of thing that Hitler got into, wiping out those who in his opinion were not 'pure,' to name just one. Again, I'd like to try and understand just how you arrived at such a conclusion.

I think I must stand on the classic Christian explanation, that God created [made up], and that included the much discussed 'free will' for his special creation .. humankind. That this good world has gone wrong, but still retains the memory of what it ought to have been. Goodness is in this sense .. * itself,* whereas evil or badness is in fact spoiled goodness, but there has to *be* something good before it can be spoiled!! I think I'll go further and endure the derision of many on this board, and say that I believe that the devil is a fallen angel. Please don't judge me by the fundamentalist right wing of the church who are forever exorcising demon's from people, because that's not what I'm talking about. But the Bible, [where I stand] talks so much and so seriously about a Dark Power in the Universe ... a mighty evil spirit who is held to be the power behind death and disease and sin. However the Bible also tells me that this power was created by God and was good .. and went wrong. Sound familiar? It/He just lives in a different realm to me, but has influence over my realm. It makes sense to me, the horrible thing is that I can also understand that it doesn't make sense to others and therefore opens the way for folk to ridicule me and stop listening to anything at all that I might say, therefore it's

Joy, I didn't realise it would run to three posts!!!!

It makes sense to me, the horrible thing is that I can also understand that it doesn't make sense to others and therefore opens the way for folk to ridicule me and stop listening to anything at all that I might say, therefore it's not easy to say. So Christianity agrees with dualism, that this Universe is at war, but does not believe that the war is between two independent powers, it's more of a civil war .. a rebellion. In fact that is what Judaism calls Satan or the Devil .. the Adversary or the Rebeller.

Whew, what a long post, think I'll go to bed and cringe as I wait for folk to either ignore me or laugh at me. Don't know which is worse really.

Hi Marie, thank's for the link.

It doesn't, as you probably already have guessed, answer my quetions.

1) Radio-carbon dating is only valid up to 50,000 years. There are at least 4 maybe more other radio-dating methods in use which are realiable and not mentioned by the web site. Why?

2) A number of the problems it's cites are "circular" they are using unproven creation science to say why something is in error. Saying the flood altered the radio-metric properties of materials is simply wrong. We have calibrated our results against samples which have never been subject to terrestial flooding and we find the same radio-metric results. Why?

Oh, indeed I do. <g> That's my point, which you made more cogently than I did. Creationists will classify animals, concepts and phenomena to suit the biblical account, rather than to try and produce a scientific and self-consistent account independently of the bible. What they want to do, is to separate man from the animals, whereas scientists see that man is another animal. No matter how close a relationship between man and apes, they will always deny the possibility of this degree of evolution in the human lineage, while happily accepting it, and even greater degrees of evolution, for other species, because they don't see those as a threat to the divinity and superiority of the human species.

So thus the ape --> human transition, however minor it is genetically, will always be impossible "macro" evolution to them. However, I think you'll find little agreement among creationists about the nature of the [very similar] relationship between lion and tiger, or horse and donkey, and in fact, I suspect you'll find they are capable of arguing both ends against the middle and coming up with whatever conclusion suits their argument at that point in time.

Joy Busey

I forget which post it was, but you said that you thought humans were evil. I really can't share this negative view of humanity :) Humans are just another species, no more and no less. Because of that incredible adaptation, technological intelligence, we are capable of a major impact on the environment, and that's not usually an improvement. Also, we do tend, like other primates, to squabble amongst ourselves. But you know, we don't do it nearly as much as other apes, and we are capable of great feats of kindness, science, arts, philosophy... I can't see how we could be more intrinsically evil than intrinsically good. The short answer, I believe, is we are neither. We just have the capacity to achieve good or evil results.

Rosemary - I will attempt to answer a few of your good questions. Please forgive my obvious lack of talent with words. I tend to be technically-minded, and when beginning with a whole conceptual framework in my own understanding, sometimes get lost on the sub-concepts which must be established prior to presenting the whole.

Duality, for purposes of faith in something more than ourselves, is essentially as you described it - "Christianity agrees with dualism, that this Universe is at war, but does not believe that the war is between two independent powers, it's more of a civil war .. a rebellion."

I am of the opinion that evil is a human flaw, and that manifestations of evil proceed from human presence in the world. The world exists in a space-time universe where everything is relative to everything else (modified by underlying uncertainty of existence), thus evil is measured relatively. It cannot be an independent ‘god,’ since its power is limited to the manipulations of humankind, and would not exist if humans were not present. It is independent of its opposite by virtue of free will, also a human trait.

Evil can be considered absolute in spiritual terms because it is part of us. Wherever its seat, it engenders the rebellion you speak of, and keeps it going by constant manipulation even when we have surrendered to the perceived power of the ‘Other.’ Religion calls it sin, backsliding... Catholics say priests can mitigate it, and they’ve even been known to sell tickets to heaven on those terms. Yet in our experience, evil is always present. And evil always seeks an independent ‘god’ status its creator never gave it.

Rosemary - Continued

I am amazed by some of the posts here about genetic engineering and artificial intelligence, cloning, and other aspects of what I call "creation technology." The gleeful assertions of godly power are (by some, not all) put forward in emphatic terms by the very same posters who most adamantly claim that an original special creation is rubbish. Some have asserted to me that evil doesn’t exist, and that moral/ethical ‘rules’ in the development of creation technology are unnecessary. It is a rejection of the notion that there are ‘oughts’ we need to follow as we approach this fork in our evolutionary road, in favor of the sheer power and joy of becoming ‘god’ and tossing out all the rules because ‘god’ doesn’t need rules.

What I see in the above-described observations is frightening, because it so closely adheres to the description of that projected "Devil" or "Satan," whose rebellion is and always was the Intention to Become God. To usurp God’s creation (or, in this case, creation prerogative). If humanity were to proceed from this juncture without even trying to grasp what it really means to the totality of ourselves, we are in big trouble.

(Aside) This, Leszek, is what I’d like to see explored on this board, not a technical evaluation of fossil dating methods or statistical probabilities for finding a better "Lucy." Since it’s not my board to rule, I don’t mind. Evaluate away... §:o)

Rosemary - Again...

My most vexing interpretational problem is that I subscribe to the description of God-Other-AntiEvil as "ONE". This implies an internal unity of being. I also subscribe to the belief that this ONE spoke (however that is accomplished in Godland) the universe we inhabit into being. That means the ONE which spoke was preexistent in some fashion, and is not native here. Evil is native in that it’s human. I have encountered evil many times. I have never seen the Devil, but I’ve never seen God, either. I have seen Angels, though! If there are bad angels as well as good ones (another duality) here, personification of them would be expected so long as they are perceived.

Biblical theologist Reinhold Niebuhr observed that: "Human life points beyond itself. But it must not make itself into that beyond. This is to commit the basic sin of man."

Augustine said: "...there are some things which we do not believe unless we understand them; and there are other things which we do not understand unless we believe them."

We stand on the threshold of creation, yet we are at the farthest moment from creation. At the beginning of that farthest creation, from where-when matter and energy perform the wonders that so fascinate us, there is a Singularity. A point of purely theoretical existence because it has no mass of its own and takes up no space, but contains within itself everything that subsequently "Is" bound in a state of Perfect Symmetry. Duality, the dual functions of matter and energy defining the parameters of the universe we inhabit, was not duality when it was Singularity. I’d expect to find "First Cause" of creation on the ‘other’ side of that Singularity. I think this is far more impressive a feat than cloning sheep or engineering bacteria.

I apologize for the radical right analogy, Cliff. Looked a lot like the same brick wall the ‘other’ radical right builds. I’m somewhere in between as well, but I do know that analogies provided by science are pretty apt to my understanding of the psychology behind the myths of origin. These archetypes represent a part of ourselves as necessary as reason and empirical logic. So I believe.

"Heck, as near as I can tell, the only difference between you and Jerry Falwell is that he believes in the Devil and that man is evil due to the influence of the Devil. You, on the other hand, believe man is evil without the influence of the Devil."

How is the "influence" factor significantly different from the "perception" factor that we should strive not to give in to the "influence?" Extremely imprecise definitions, and since I have never encountered a red guy with horns and tail telling me to do bad things (or telling that river to flood), I suspect that image is a psychological projection. We personify that projection as ugly, because we "perceive" that it is ugly. A beast. I still think it’s in us.

"I certainly suspect you are in error." - So do I, Cliff, and I have so admitted. Not all of us know the difference between good and evil. Is this the Devil’s "influence?"

I apologize for so many posts, but I get here only occasionally, and have a lot to answer! thanks...

Is there nothing about us that you find special, Cliff? Is our ability to view creation from a perspective both outside of the limitations of ourselves and outside the immediate time constraints of existence not something unique in all of nature on this planet? Is that psychological and/or spiritual ‘extra’ dimension not meaningful in any way?

Again from Niebuhr: "This essential homelessness of the human spirit is the ground of all religion; for the self which stands outside itself and the world cannot find the meaning of life in itself or the world."

"I suggest you make your argument, anyway." - Thank you. That is what I am now trying to do. Please bear with me.

Cliff, Leszek,
The point I have been struggling to make is that there really is no such thing as "speciation." Things change. When they have changed enough it makes sense to label them with a new species name, but this is simply for our conveniance, the life-form in question is just "one iota" different than before.

This whole mirco-macro thing is just a device to make it more dificult to contemplate large changes over time. Large changes are vanishingly rare; It is the acumulation of the many, many small changes that makes the difference! "Micro" and "Macro" define, at best, a time scale, not a qualitative difference.

Joy (and co.),
To brashly plagerize pop-culture; Evil is as evil does. Evil is action. Evil has no existance, and indeed, no meaning, outside the scope of the consideration of action (or inaction in some cases) on the part of sentient beings. Ebola is not evil, but a serial killer is.

Motivation is also fairly insignificant as it only applies from a condition of positive intent; e.g., One can do evil while intending good through either ignorance or sloth (good motivation does not negate evil action.) but one can not be good if they intend evil, even if their action do not demonstrate evil through ignorance or sloth.

Both cases demonstrate evil. Case 1 is well intentioned, but evil nonetheless. Case 2 is evil intentions where the results are meaningless (towards the judgment of evil on the perpatrator's part.) It seems that evil can only be avoided by both intending and acting good.

Your post really puzzles me. No-one has rejected any such "oughts" outright; nor has anyone rejected the fact of actions with good or evil effects, though we may disagree with your personification of evil; nor has anyone rejected the importance of ethics. We have simply pointed to the limitations of using the bible (or indeed any other religious texts) in analysing real-life facts and observations. No-one has said the bible is devoid of useful moral teaching. If you can point to a post that has done so, point away.

Neither has anyone claimed to be usurping "god-like" powers. What scientists do today with cloning is more akin to breeding experiments than anything remotely god-like. Is it really likely that human beings could ever create a universe or even a world? I think not, and I doubt scientists are getting carried away by hubris to the extent you claim. At least I've seen no evidence of it on this board - perhaps we haven't been reading the same posts.

BTW, these are public boards, and with a title as broad as "Science and Religion", you have to expect a fairly wide variety of perspectives. If what I am interested in about this topic is not to your taste, you are welcome to post around it as there is no obligation to answer anyone's posts - it's no skin off my nose :)

Basically, I agree with your view. I don't think we know quite enough about the process of speciation yet to say whether you are exactly right, or always right, though I think you are much more right than wrong. What I wonder about, for example, is a transition such as that from the common ape ancestor to modern chimps and people, where a chromosome had to split in two, or two became fused... that could be a potential major transitional point, but we know little about how that might happen. There's room for plenty of research here too.

What irritates me in cases like this is the creationist penchant for pointing to the problem and saying in effect, "Look! Scientists have no instant solution of this, therefore there cannot be any, and God did this directly!", only to end up some years later, after the research has been painstakingly done by some harmless drudge with no axe to grind, with egg on their face. Not that they ever admit the egg is there, but that's par for the course too :)

(Oh, and apologies to the metaphysicists among us for posting a practical and earthbound post.)

People speak of the ultimate machine as something that is the equivalent of themselves - able to reproduce, able to think, able to repair itself.

To be able to accomplish this, mankind would have to have the technology to control the cell level in every aspect.

Control of such magnitude in the hands of an entity that has not escaped war in any generation of its existence is scary.

If mankind was capable of creating a machine that was capable of reproducing, repairing itself and other biological traits - what would be the difference between the man and the machine?

Keith, I thank you for this observation. You have, I believe, correctly identified the manifestations of evil as relative. I also see those manifestations as relative. You also qualify this as measured relative the the acting "sentient" being. What "sentient" being is that?

Your statement that Ebola, a living thing if not a "sentient" being, is not evil, but a serial killer is. Now, tigers have been reputed to be serial killers, in that they tend to develop a taste for human beings. Given that the tiger’s nature is to kill and eat, you and I would not qualify this preference as evil even if the tiger had to be hunted down and killed because of its taste for humans. A tiger is, however, fairly "sentient." It developed the taste, and used its skills to satisfy its craving.

Conversely, you identify the serial killer, presumably human, as evil. This speaks exactly to the relativity point on several levels here, i.e. "Eye of the Beholder." If the sentient being who commits evil is the same sentient being who defines evil, can evil be outside of us?

Sure wish I could remember to put that nifty Anti-Font on all my posts!

Leszek #712 - "If what I am interested in about this topic is not to your taste, you are welcome to post around it as there is no obligation to answer anyone's posts"

I have already answered this quite humbly, I believe. I do not attempt to control or limit your discussion. My peeve arose from the fact that there is an evolution board, with excellent discussion, that hasn’t been used in days. I think it’s a fascinating subject worthy of it’s own board, which CNN provided. That’s all. I agree there are cross-threads pertinent to science in general and religion (evident on the evolution board as well). Science in general encompasses further fields.

"Is it really likely that human beings could ever create a universe or even a world?"

This was pretty much the same answer God gave to Job. Glad it’s something you grasp. If we live through the next century, I wouldn’t put it past human beings to engineer habitable planets, nor to populate those planets with life forms of our own creation. This is something we should consider with all its forseeable ramifications now rather than then.

"...perhaps we haven't been reading the same posts."

I guess not. And I’ll keep that in mind, thanks. Luckily, my nose is rubber. §:o)

Joy,
I do not maintain that each individual gets to define evil for his/her own conveniance.

The rules, margins of behaivior and the exceptions must, if not clearly defined, at least be reasonably presented to the society within which one exists. The Tiger, for instance, is not evil because it is not detrimental to the morality of Tigers to eat people. To people, the Tiger is, of course, a danger, but to clasify the Tiger as evil is, IMO, arogant. Who are we that we should justify the actions of all beings in this world as good or evil based on our own selfish needs?

The serial killer is evil because he (yes, almost without exceptions they are male) acts in such a way as to increase suffering and degrade the spiritual condition of humanity at large through the erosion of faith. He also does this with full intention as the primary motivation of the serial killer is to empower himself at the expense of others. (Is there even one of the seven deadly sins that the serial killer is not indulging in?)

I am glad we agree on the necessity for rules. Since God doesn’t talk to us a lot lately, at least not on CNN or NPR, we have to formulate those rules for ourselves. Thus it is imperative that we recognize the nature of what it is we need rules to protect us against.

"The serial killer is evil because he acts in such a way as to increase suffering and degrade the spiritual condition of humanity at large through the erosion of faith. He also does this with full intention as the primary motivation of the serial killer is to empower himself at the expense of others."

Here, you have identified the evil as human by virtue of the human tendency to be evil. We agree. The tiger’s motivation is hunger, complicated by a taste for humans to satisfy the hunger. The evil human’s motivation is as you described it, the empowerment of self over others. This we term evil, and is inherant only to ourselves in all of known creation.

Where would you assign the human tendency to empower one’s self above others in terms of deadly sins, since I also agree that murder contains within itself all the identified manifestations of its motivation. Is the motivation for such evil eminating from the wellspring of the deadly sins? If so, what is the nature of that wellspring and where is it located?

While terraforming a planet might well be technically possible (assuming we could afford the cost and were able to exploit it after) it would still not rise to the level of god-hood, but of a technical accomplishment, any more than genetic engineering rises to that level. A mound of termites does as well technically in regulating their environment, but we don't worship them. I don't know where this idea that technology is taking over the function of god came from. I've certainly never said any such thing.

And far from scientists today being unaware of the ethical implications of their work, they are much more aware than they were in days of yore. As I recall, it was the fundamentalist Christian, James Watt, who as Secretary for the Environment (good grief, was that an ironic appointment!) in the unlamented Reagan years called for the massive exploitation of US resources with no thought to conservation or habitat preservation, because that's what we were "put" on this earth to do by god. This was a clear case where religious and non-scientific thinking gave rise to a destructive mindset resisted by ethical scientists everywhere.

So a little less preaching about how the bible is necessary to form our ethical views in a technological age would seem in order. I guess it all depends on how you interpret that book again, and the interpretation of the religious right in those years (and I have no reason to believe it has changed) has been generally appalling.

As to the evolution/creationism controversy, sorry, I feel that's appropriate for this board as an example of the potential for a head-on collision between science and religious belief. I'm delighted to discuss purely evolutionary concepts on the other board, in a purely scientific context, but creationism definitely belongs on this one.

Hello, Rose. The difference is that we would be the creator of the machine. We did not create the materials of which it might be made (unless of some designed substance not found in nature, which we've been doing for many years in chemistry and nuclear physics). Still, there is a starting point even for the production of plutonium (U238), which we did not create.

How we might impress our creator-ship upon the machine is a troublesome problem here, as I am of the opinion that we harbor evil in ourselves, so cannot trust ourselves to pass "commandments" to our creation that are not ultimately designed to serve our own egotism as creators.

Of course, one might also make the same point about "submission" and "worship" of that which created the universe. Funny how reflections reflect, isn't it? §:o)

You two may, for all I know, but I don't. People have no inherent tendency to be evil, I really don't see where you get this idea from. When I look around me, I see more good and morally neutral behavior, by and large, than evil behavior. By a long shot.

No, that's not complete. First, hunger, fear, anger, hate are simply emotions. There is no evil attached to any of them until an action is taken. Humans have other motivations that the tiger does not share, this is true, because we are rather different animals. But the comparative case should be the chimpanzee, which has a much more violent society (in technological proportion, of course) than people do, and which nevertheless has recognizably human characteristics. This includes hunting, "murder" of other chimpanzees, wars, cannibalism, deliberate deceit to gain an end at the expense of other chimps (especially in concealing food sources), and several other very human-like behaviors.

So if you are going to call such behaviors "evil" in humans, you'd better be prepared to call it "evil" in chimps, with all the philosophical implications you might fear from that. What price the evolution debate with respect to moral values now?

It is certainly an interesting hypothesis to entertain, and Jim Rapp might be interested, that science might well have some insights into why we feel that some things are moral while others are immoral, and that we may not need a deity to do this for us.

Joy, thankyou for your full and complete reply, I knew we couldn't be as far apart as I erroneously imagined. I'm seriously considering 'running away' from these boards at the moment, I'm not strong enough I find to take the flak. Oh my 'overweening pride' to use your wonderful expression.

But do termites worship themselves or their power to create what "Termiteous The God of Termites" emplaced in their termite consciousness as the Imperitive To Create Termite Mounds? §:o)

Actually, I don’t mind termites at all so long as they eat dead logs instead of my house. If they choose to eat my house, we’ve got a state of war.

"it was the fundamentalist Christian, James Watt, who as Secretary for the Environment (good grief, was that an ironic appointment!) in the unlamented Reagan years called for the massive exploitation of US resources with no thought to conservation or habitat preservation, because that's what we were "put" on this earth to do by god."

Thank God some of us have some innate intelligence along with our innate desire to play god! Fundamentalists of any stripe (meaning hard right) are pretty intolerable. Those political ones, for instance, keep telling me they’re going to "take the country back." I keep wondering if they’re intending to "take it back" from me...

Joy, I'm sorry but I must. Perhaps it will only be a 'break' I can't tell but I need to withdraw and replenish. This board is certainly more polite than the religion board, but the undercurrents are there and I'm a fool if I think I can handle it, because I patently can't. God be with you .. Rosemary.

Rosemary, excuse me for butting in, but I hope you don't go, and if so come back soon.

Speaking of evolution and the humanity of man as unique to that of just another animal; please note historical use of evolution:

1. Lenin

2. Hitler

3. The south to validate slavery

4. Abortion

Evolution does want to erase the uniqueness of humans, that we are just another animal, and not any more special than a rat. We may have a self-fullfilling prophesy, if evolutionists want to keep de-humanizing mankind.

Marie - you should know that inappropriate use of a scientific theory to justify social policy in spheres the theory does not apply to, does not disprove the theory. It's not my fault or the fault of any evolutionist that Hitler, Lenin, and slave owners, mostly religious, I might add, didn't understand the theory of evolution. I've never heard it applied to abortion, so I've no idea what you're talking about there. (Unless you mean as part of eugenics, which is covered under "Hitler", and is a completely invalid application.)

Partly true and partly not. True, we're another animal, and we are not special, in that there is no ladder inevitably leading to our development.

But we're not just another animal. We are special to each other. In the big scheme of things, man doesn't amount to much, perhaps, but that's not the scale we find valuable. I think you'll find, Marie, that evolutionists appreciate the value of other humans and their unique contributions to science and culture as much as anyone else. I'm really rather surprised you should claim otherwise.

God Bless You as well, my friend! And if you see a beautiful, hand-tooled, mid-sized ark (sailing vessel) in the harbor this December, wave a flag and we'll come pick you up for watching fireworks!

As a side note Hitler was a purported Roman Catholic who felt no compunction at eliminating people based on religious affiliation.

Evolution was never used to validate slavery in the South. Much of the history of slavery occurred before the Origin of Species was ever published. Well guess what the source really was. Yes the Bible and the purported "Curse of Ham" which gave the many groups of people in the sciptures free reign at enslaving others.

Amicus certus in incerta re cernit.

A sure friend is found in an unsure situation.

Pax Tecum.

Peace be with you.

Accepted. I'll take rebuke, but there are limits.:)Thank you, you're a gentleman.

What they want to do, is to separate man from the animals, whereas scientists see that man is another animal. No matter how close a relationship between man and apes, they will always deny the possibility of this degree of evolution in the human lineage, while happily accepting it,...Leszek Rzpecki #704.

You keep saying micro.macro/evolution is a creationist idea. Why is it used by evolutionists also? I agree that there is variation, adaptation ,in all species, including man, but each species remains in it's species. The evidence palentologists have is not, to me, very direct or obvious in proving evolution. They have fossils of unknown age, ( they can only presume their methods are correct.) They can only assume alot of things, they make up stories to go with the bones they found. It really takes more faith to believe in all those assumptions, and presumptions.

Not that it matters but I happen to be African American.

Continued: You yourself wrote that man is just another animal; to scientists.

Since this is the science/and religion board, I can make historical note of how the preceived theory of evolution affected man's own regard for himself, and what those consequences were.

Hitler used it to advance the Arian race and killed all types of peoples, most notably the Jews, whom he considered less than human, due to his skewed perceptions.

In the time before the Civil War, the arguement was used by slave owners that Darwin's theory showed them that Blacks are inferior.

Abortion: Carl Sagans's rendition of his ignorance of fetal development, and embrology, relates the fetus to fish, and not quite human yet.

Lenin- what more can I say?

My point is what good is this humanistic theory? Science, it is not.

The Origin of Species was published in 1860 - near the start of the Civil War. It is unlikely that slave holders would have time to read much less understand the published text while Sherman, Grant and others, including the 54th Massachusetts Infantry, pounded them into submission.

E.C. Hitler was half Jew himself, and he also killed Catholics, Christians, and as you stated any religious affilliation. He was a madman. Would he have thought of ethic killings without Darwin? I wonder.

I agree the South did use that noxious "son of Ham" garbage before Darwin's theory was published in 1859, ( Darwin married his cousin BTW: Bernard Schopper.) It was well-known even, then that it wasn't healthy for your offspring to marry close relatives.)

The true biblical teaching regarding races and separation of races, can be found with Moses, who married an Eithopian woman, and when Moses' sister, had the audacity to critisize Moses about it, God cursed the sister with leprocy. So that pretty much, is what I think about the Son of Ham people. Also Song of Solmon is a love sonnet about a married couple. Black lady and King Solomon. I guess those Southerns back at that time didn't really study their Bible.

How can you argue for a point when there is insufficient evidence in the Bible prohibiting it?

We probably shouldn't get into a whole Civil War discussion, but even though Origins wasn't published, until the times we've mentioned, it certainly was timely for the South who were attempting to hang onto their free labor, and it gave them another excuse to validate slavery as a right.

Also, honestly, I didn't read your link on Carl Sagan, until after I wrote about him to Leszek. It is a humbling perception, and a good one to reflect on in some ways. I don't like Carl Sagan much, though:)

Even if Southerners read the Origin of Species, they would be the last people on Earth to conceive that man was not created in God's image. In many ways, they were the ultimate fundamentalists and would probably be more comfortable burning the text than contemplating it.

There's plenty of evidence in the Bible to be against abortion, and also plenty of medical evidence, and just good common sense. I can give you some Bible verses. There are multple reference in the Psalms and Proverbs, to how much God hates the sheading of innocent blood. God punished societies which worshiped gods that required them to throw their children in Fires to Baal. Including the Israelites, when they followed, these practices.

I can't deny that there were many hypercrites. Also many who were not religous used it as a politcal arguement. I think the Fundamentalist Southern back in that time, seemed to compartmentalize the made in God's image to just the white man. I know it doesn't make rational sense to anyone now. But unfortunately we still have neo-nazi groups, and white supremisists around, they don't make sense either.:(

Matt Neujhar - Saturday, 01/23/99,(#637)

"I completely agree with Russell that "whale" is an awful translation." One step forward, and I applaud. Then two steps sideways: "I would opt for ‘sea serpent'. The Hebrew tanniyn. Cognates occur in Arabic, Aramaic (including Syriac, I believe) and Ethiopic.". And I stare in puzzlement. And then I remember, of course, that you are still standing on the outside, looking in as a nonbeliever, looking to discredit, looking to do the academically correct thing, to make it a literary, comparative religion sort of exercise. So once again you close your eyes to seeing something new. As Jesus said, so often, "let those who have eyes to see..."

Forget, for a minute, your disbelief, and stop treating the Bible (or just Genesis) as mere literature, or a collection of literatures stolen from all around the neighborhood. And just "pretend", if you must, that it is true, and that it thus is logical and consistent within itself, that it follows laws as natural as hose of our cosmos. If you are willing to do that, then I can as you a couple of questions, the answers to which, will suggest a different answer.

First. In a creation account that is about 30 verses long, and that starts at T= 0 (Big Bang) and that covers the creation of the universe, and the creation the plant kingdom (from single cell to flowering fruit trees) and the animal kingdom (from single cell to H. sapiens), and never once mentions or alludes to anything mythical, or fanciful or imaginary or other "creature" found in neighboring "religions" or "myths" or "literatures (in other words, less than "natural" real existent, or once existing)...why would that account, in just this one instance, include a fanciful "monster"? Especially a sea monster, which should have been rather pointless to a desert, non sea-going people?

Now, you say that "In Isaiah 51:9 the word appears in a parallelism with Rahab, both as person

Matt Neujhar concluded

"... both as personifications of primordial chaos. Rahab is the proper name of such a supernatural sea creature..."" but you have to be ignoring the fact that "Rahab" is a rather derogatory name for Egypt, and the verse is applauding God's destruction of Egypt at the Red Sea! No sea monster there! Two similar sounding words in the universe do not mean shared (or evolutionarily related) meanings or cultures

Second. The word in question, tanniyn is paired with a modifier, an adjective, we would say. That word is gadowl. The KJV translated it as "great", as in "great whales". Well, the word gadowl deserves even more than that connotation. It connotes REALLY GREAT, it connotes noble, proud, might, haughty, insolent. All terms I would rather attach to the dinosaurs, who owned the world for a very long time, than a sea monster. In fact, being mostly submerged, and being mainly associated with destroying men and ships, not haughtily and proudly strutting by... I think the term doesn't fit "sea monster" a all!

Suspension of disbelief is often a criteria necessary for the enjoyment of fanciful stories and magic shows. In other words:

I'm familiar with those verses, most if you read the whole story, will show God's judgement for killing their son. The verse about the woman who miscarries, if two men fight, means, the man only pays a fine if the miscarriage caused only a premature birth, but the child lives,

if you read the next verse it defines stronger punishment, as life for life, an eye for an eye if the child dies.

Psalms 139:13-15. Proverbs 6:17 That's only a couple. There are more, but I better turn in for the night. :)

And thus abortion clinic bombings.

I don't think it is, or at least not as a rigorously defined scientific concept. Even in creationist writings, it seems to mean whatever they want to mean at the time. Though I think that you have a specific meaning in mind (variation vs. evolution in my terms) I really have no handle on what those words mean when others use them. For example, I'm not even sure that you and Cliff Beall, for example, mean the same thing by it.

Just as an example, would you consider lions and tigers, or horses and donkeys examples of macro or micro? Just how large does the genetic change have to be to be considered macro? Why cannot many micro changes amount to a macro change? I mean, let's say 1 unit of genetic change (an abstract unit, it can be as small as you like) corresponds to a micro change. Suppose you have a 100 consecutive units of change, over a 100 generations? Or 10,000 over 10,000 generations? Would that then cumulatively amount to a macro change? And if not, why not?

Well, you keep repeating this as an article of dogma, and I can't figure out why. Whenever I ask what conceivable evidence is there that you would accept as suggestive of evolution, I get the impression that you have decided from first principles that evolution is impossible, so that there is no evidence that could possibly convince you. Under those circumstances, where every piece of evidence I produce for this phenomenon is dismissed out of hand as ridiculous, it doesn't make for a fruitful exchange.

Keith Fosberg has pointed out some problems in thinking about speciation... you can *never* define the point at which one species changes into another, because the changes from generation to generation are so small as to be unnoticeable. It's only when you look at the changes over many hundreds of generations, that it becomes clear that a change has occurred, and by then violá! - you have a new species. And that's exactly the picture that the fossil record gives you.

Of course that doesn't mean the original species has disappeared, necessarily, but that another species has evolved from it. Perhaps this is the basis of our continued talking at cross-purposes?

I explained to you that flawed applications of a theory in a field it was never designed to illuminate do not disprove it. I could explain why evolutionary theory is misapplied in eugenics by people such as the Nazis, but Stephen J. Gould does a much better job than I ever could in his book The Mismeasure of Man. I recommend it as an antidote to the misappropriatian of Darwinian thinking by eugenicists.

Would you like me to apply the same reasoning to Christianity because of its involvement in the Inquisition, slavery, and the genocide of native North and South Americans? Why do you apply it to evolution? Your reasoning is inconsistent.

Forgive me for interjecting myself into this debate...

You said:

Well, I'm not going to argue about whether it might refer to a sea monster or not, but I have to say that when I think of dinosaurs, images of nobility, pride, and insolence are far from my mind. Even power is dubious, as most dinosaurs were pretty tiny, with several exciting and spectacular exceptions that fire our imaginations.

The trouble I have with the interpretation that the Genesis account could be referring to the larger dinosaurs, is that the dates are all wrong. In the last 65 million years, there have been no living dinosaurs (unless you count birds, which is still questionable). The oldest fully human fossil is a only tens of thousands of years old. I'd be much happier to see human and dino fossils regularly (or even once) occurring in the same rock strata before I accept that explanation.

Perhaps the Genesis account was referring to sabre-tooth tigers, mammoths, Nile crocodiles, or even buffalo and all co-existed with people at one time - all of these conjure up the images you refer to. Or perhaps they have the same origins as stories today of the Loch Ness Monster... similar sightings have been reported in freshwater lakes the world over, and the fertile crescent must have been much more lush at one time before human overusage destroyed it.

Hi all.

I've caught up.

I've read, mostly carefully, more than 100 recent posts.

Very interesting.

We know, however, that genetic disorders affect moral formation. Heriditable conditions such as Fragile X, Huntington's disease, PKU, and others affect emotional and cognitive capacities requisite to adult moral formation. I wouldn't be surprised to learn of numerous forthcoming discoveries of several genes affecting individual development with consequences for emotional and cognitive competence at moral formation.

By adult moral formation, I don't mean mere rote citations of moral codes. I mean case-by-case, casuistic applications, real life applications, of detailed and substantive moral rules. I mean intelligent and careful best case/worst case analysis in cases where rules seem indeterminable.

Heritable conditions affect moral capacity.

So what?

(concluded next post)

All (catching-up, concluded this post)

Leszeck, Joy, Rosemary, I say that basic moral senses pass epigenetically.

What does this mean?

First, these senses are merely basic, broad, vague, and sometimes fragile. Second, these epigenetic moral senses are likely few in number: basic trust, or a basic sense of self determination, play, work, intimacy, and even a mature sense of basic ideological integrity. Third, the moral component in these basic senses does not include a full moral code or methodology. Fourth, broad dispositions such as depression, aggression, passivity, sexual attraction and orientation, and others dispositions, too have genetic correlates. Fifth, we normally think of evolution as a foundational study in quantitative heredity, or population genetics, without specific focus, as here, on individual development. I say evolution includes both. Sixth, the specific contents of any moral code or methodology come from social nurture.

In short, epigenesis means for morality that our genes set limits to individual biological and behavioral development from conception to old age, and, that these genetic constraints support an integrated process of social, environmental, and cultural nurture.

I'll try to tease more of this idea out in upcoming posts as well as to learn more of your opinions.

Jim

... to how much God hates the sheading of innocent blood. - Marie M.

Leszek Rzepecki - Tuesday, 01/26/99, 4:58:33am (#752 of 757)

The line of demarcation that I learned was that disparate species cannot interbreed, so you have a clear pointfor testing hypothese.

Bill U,

That is the standard line draw by biology, it is, however, not good enough for creationists (nor Marie) in that by that standard there are numerous examples of specification. Wallabees, Mosquittos, rat-worm larvae etc etc etc...

The common response is that these are still obviously a XXXXX - even though they are already unable to interbreed with their root species and, in the case of the London Underground Mosquitto's exhibiting morphological changes.

Dave ON - Tuesday, 01/26/99, 8:13:13am (#759 of 759)

Not being an expert in biology, I would not know about those specimins, but as a clarification I would not include a physical hinderance to mating as a cause of speciation. as although it is not too bloody likely that a Taco Bell dog (cant spell the name of that little sucker) and a German shepard, invitro fertilization can occur and breed a cross breed indicating that they are still of the same species.

I understand what you say, but these ones I have mentioned are biologically incompatable when it comes to breeding.

That's a reasonable rule of thumb, but it doesn't always work. For example, no-one disputes that lions and tigers, and horses and donkeys, are separate but similar species, but they can interbreed though their offspring are sterile. So are lions and tigers different kinds, according to the bible, or the same kind? Or something in between? I'd really like a creationist response to that question, as I don't understand this rather flexible concept of "kind".

I think there are two problems here. For one thing, speciation doesn't occur instantly (as far as we know). So lions and tigers may be less far along the speciation spectrum than, oh, say bears and racoons. Also, for example, there are species of finches that are more widely separated genetically than chimps and people, but are lumped in together as sub-species, whereas people and chimps, with less genetic divergence, are treated completely separately.

So I think we do have problems in figuring out which category a pair of closely related species fits into, and that's part of the problem when creationists and evolutionists talk past each other. As often as not, they are talking apples and oranges, and often don't even realise it. That's why it's important to define terms when getting into scientific debate in a religious context... we are not always agreed on definitions and meanings.

Leszek Rzepecki - Tuesday, 01/26/99, 11:38:26am (#762 of 762)

I'm perfectly happy letting science define this. I guess it's one of the benefits of being Catholic :). The Church has always viewed the sciences are describing what God has given us. As opposed to the fundamentalist mindset that views the Bible as the only source of facts. I keep telling people that even though Cleveland isn't mentioned in the Bible, it still exists (go to Ohio and inhale for proof).

Emotions are evident in a wide range of life forms, including plants if emotion is defined as reaction to stimuli. Some plants also make their living from destroying other plants. I would hardly term this "evil," and neither would you. Chimpanzees are very bright and close natural relatives, so it’s not surprising that their emotional displays include many of the same ones we see in humans, including the killing of like kind. Chimps are so smart, in fact, that they (like dogs) can probably be taught by humans to kill on command.

I would argue that "hate" does not belong in your list of shared emotions. In nature, there are reasons for reaction to stimuli, more subjective the higher you go up the food chain, but reasonable in terms of survival, reproductive viability, and all the other natural criteria that define who’s at the top of the chain. "Hate" is something which does not serve a natural purpose, and I do not think hate can be attributed to the chimp who kills his rival (and then his rival’s children) in order to further his own genetic superiority in the scheme of things.

That chimps and other species do kill for the reasons nature provides is ample evidence that we do carry the capacity to act likewise in our natural genetic structure. Behavior is influenced by genes and the chemistry those genes promote.

Hate, like Evil, is human. Why? Because humans have the intellectual capacity to invent reasons of their own to kill, which are not dictated by nature. Worse, humans also have the ability to stand outside the limitations of nature to formulate moral judgments against their natural proclivities. They know (or most of them know) the difference between Good and Evil. They choose to do evil, knowing that it is wrong (by whatever scale of judgm

(continued)

Worse, humans also have the ability to stand outside the limitations of nature to formulate moral judgments against their natural proclivities. They know (or most of them know) the difference between Good and Evil. They choose to do evil, knowing that it is wrong (by whatever scale of judgment) to do evil. This is evil.

Bill, I do declare, after all our ups and downs on various boards, we've hit another oasis of agreement <g> perhaps they're not as rare as all that.

Joy, I completely agree with you that humans have a vastly superior sense of right and wrong, or good and evil, than do dogs or even chimps. I do agree that people are unique among the animals, but only in this sense, that their capacity for intelligence and self-awareness surpasses that of other animals. This is for reasons that I as a scientist do not yet understand, but that theologians claim they have an answer to, so I'll agree to differ on that particular point in advance.

I do not mean, however, that our self-awareness, and hence our sense of good and evil, are different in kind from analogous senses in chimps (I'll pass on the dog issue), but chimps are able to sense, identify, and (importantly) share a number of emotions in humans. I present for consideration the sense of loss, grief and mourning. There is observational evidence of chimps in the wild that they experience a sense of loss on the death of a friend or relative. They exhibit behavior that in humans we would associate with grief and depression. They can also recognize similar feelings in humans, and offer comfort. (Even elephants appear to mourn their losses, though I don't want to make too much of that.)

I'm just arguing that sophisticated emotional senses aren't unique to people, just that they are more finely honed. And further, that our emotional senses are the birthplace of our moral senses. Which is why I firmly believe that evil springs from our perceptions of the effects of actions, and is not the cause of them. Because then I would have to stipulate that the rest of nature is similarly evil, and that, frankly, is not a world I care to inhabit.

Jim Rapp - I'm thinking about your posts, will try and come up with something :)

I would definitely agree that genes effect cognizance, and we may presume there to be a genetic predisposition to hold our natural violent tendencies in check. Genes may effect how well the predisposition is understood and implemented. I also agree that both genetic and acquired functional disabilities effect these same factors, as does learning (environment). I just do not believe we can attribute our innate recognition of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ to genetics.

We can probably attribute the bell curve of our statistical proclivities to the relative strength of the genetic predisposition, but not the evil itself. I concede the ‘good’ which is morally judged to be better than the ‘evil’ opposition is probably culturally biased, thus not absolute. Moral codes are products of human experience, and the human ability to analyze that experience rationally. Intelligence and rationality are also closely related to the machinery we inherit through nature, so exists on relative terms.

I do not believe that intelligence, an evolutionary development in the human animal, is the seat of good and evil, or our tendency to choose evil would have killed off the species long ago. The thing that separates humans from the rest of the animal kingdom is not necessarily the number of neurons in our brain, but the element of choice - ‘Free Will’ - which persists to this day in defiance of the gene which should be present by now to counter the species-threatening tendency to choose evil. If free will is epigenetically tied to intelligence (the distinguishing charicteristic of our species), intelligence is a very bad evolutionary idea.

Anyway.... My point on "species" was not a denial that species exist, but a denial that the change from one species to another is an "event" as in "observed a speciation event."

Clouds that statr on the western horizon may very well be on the eastern horizon hours later, but they went smoothly across, they didn't suddenly transpose themselves!

I agree, BTW, with your view. Science describes the mechanics of God's creation.

I agree that emotional senses are natural (grief, joy, depression, loneliness, affection, etc.). I believe intelligence is natural as well, the product of our physical equipment (whether acquired via evolution or special creation). I do not see how emotional senses are particularly connected to intelligence, except that our intelligence allows us to produce Prozac so we won’t feel so emotional. <g>

(Again...)

"I firmly believe that evil springs from our perceptions of the effects of actions, and is not the cause of them."

On this, I would disagree. Evil doesn’t proceed from our perception of how our actions may be perceived by ourselves or others, it proceeds from itself as a decision to act in an evil manner. To do evil. If we cared about perceptions, murder wouldn’t be so prevelent.

Grief is a good emotion to use in analogy. Grief is painful, and it is desirable to avoid pain. Murder does indeed cause grief in the survivors (effect rather than cause), but the emotional sense that grief is painful cannot be the source of our moral sense that murder as evil. This is because grief is an emotional fact of life, whether or not we ever encounter a murderer. It’s our emotional reaction to death, and death is universal across the board in all species in all generations. No "moral sense," religious absolute, code of laws, or fit of rage has ever been known to prevent death. The emotional response to death is simply the emotional response to death. It requires no particular intelligence or rationality to feel, and engenders no ‘rules.’

The same can be said of the full range of natural emotions, which exist because they exist. They are reactionary hardwiring related to our experience of the world. Thus emotions in general cannot be considered particularly ‘good’ or ‘evil,’ nor can they be the wellspring of our ability to distinguish acts that can be considered ‘good’ or ‘evil.’ IMO, of course.

I see no way whatsoever of distinguishing between good and evil without involving emotion and human perceptions. Everything else is just action, of no more import than the waves washing across a beach.

I guess I really don't understand what your point is. Mine is that evil is the mind of the beholder. To the caterpillar, the parasitic wasp is the greatest of evils. To the wasp, it's business as usual. People are really no different (as far as simple effects are concerned), except, and this is the important point, they have an understanding of what they do, and they have a conscious choice not to do it. But again, this is simply because they can perceive their actions as evil, because they cause harm to other beings.

I really don't understand your drive to have an independent "evil human-linked force" in the universe... is this an attempt to absolve people of the bad decisions they make?

I do not see how emotional senses are particularly connected to intelligence... - Joy Busey

Well, my dear, you probably have never met a cold-hearted, intelligent Kraut like me. A perfect example of how an astute mind can overrule the heart.

However, this does not mean that us smart Krauts are incapable of inflaming passions (in bed).

Leszek #771 - "I see no way whatsoever of distinguishing between good and evil without involving emotion and human perceptions."

Yes, Leszek, both emotion and perception come into play in the action-reaction sphere of good and evil, but neither emotion nor perception are the source. If they were, every creature on the planet who displayed emotion and perception could be judged in the same context of good and evil that we recognize (somehow) to applies to ourselves. We do not judge nature that way.

When a human chooses to do an evil deed, that human is personally responsible for both the deed and the consequences. This is because humans recognize the difference between good and evil, which means they have a choice.

I do not consider Evil to be a "force," nor do I believe it is independent of humanity. If it’s a bad evolutionary experiment, we readily deserve extinction and just so happen to blessed with the intelligence to pull off that very thing. I guess if I choose to believe it came from something other than nature (which I do), I’d have to view it as an effect rather than a force.

As ‘Effect’ rather than ‘Force,’ I’d have to consider the cause of that effect. Which (thank you very much!) brings me to another avenue of discussion I wish to explore... §:o)

<sigh> I am astute enough to recognize the problem with your heart, Bernhard, which has little to do with your obvious intelligence. A perfect example of the dichotomy under current discussion.

This is because humans recognize the difference between good and evil, which means they have a choice. - Joy Busey

So, you're implying that animals cannot recognize the difference between good and evil, and thus have no choice?

I have stated that I do NOT believe evil to be a product of sense perception, a consequence of intelligence, a figment of our imaginations, or an independent force of the universe. I have stated also that evil is a purely human phenomenon, thus its source must arise from within ourselves.

‘Self’ is a subjective term, but is recognizable to all (kind of like ‘evil’). We also recognize 2 distinct aspects of ‘self.’ Nature wastes no time or energy thinking great thoughts, exploring the universe, contemplating the existence of God - or of Evil. Humans do that. It cannot be reasonably asserted that nuclear weapons serve any imperative of nature or evolution. Storytelling isn’t serving a natural function either, and it was invented by humans very early in their natural existence.

This means there ‘Is’ an aspect of human nature (the totality of ourselves) that we cannot explain on purely evolutionary terms.

Some will argue that the metaphysical aspect of ‘self’ is the product of the sheer number of neurons in our brains. Neurons are great for storytelling, but the obvious threat to the natural world presented by nuclear weapons argues very well against their evolutionary value...

...unless we attribute the quest to harness the power of the universe - for the purpose of killing and/or terrorizing vast numbers of humans most efficiently - to something other than too many neurons and too much leisure time. Let’s face it, if neurons were so valuable in the evolutionary scheme of things, such a weapon would never have occurred to anybody, much less be developed at so high a cost to the species and the natural world.

Fact is, the idea did occur, to more than one intelligent human being. It was developed, and it was used. It will be used again. Why? Because this weapon is the Perfect Expression of Evil (so far), and humans are prone to evil. The nuclear mountain wasn’t climbed just because it was there, or we’d have come up with better uses.

The imperative served by the creation of such technology is not and cannot be a product of the natural world, it is something else. An outside source of evil (Devil or Force) would have to act in and on nature in general, which it does not (in my experience or to my knowledge). As an ‘Effect,’ evil could be exclusively human if the cause were exclusive to humans.

Jim, went through this one with a fine tooth comb. Rats. Couldn't find anything to disagree with! :) Our moral sense has to be some knit of nature and nurture. I'm fascinated by the development of incipient morality in other primates, which echoes our own, except of course they can't articulate it, having no language. Perhaps this could be my small contribution... morality will also be closely linked to language, because without the ability to abstract concepts, you can't theorise about them. For chimps, I suspect morality boils down to whatever feels good. Humans have a much more sophisticated sense of it.

(Btw, I'm having problems understanding Joy Busey's concept of evil. Any ideas?)

You may very well turn out to be correct. However, nature didn't evolve our neurones with the idea of nuclear weapons in mind. I suspect we evolved our brains largely to cope with our complex social interactions, as well as technological skils, which allow us to eke out a living in marginal environments. Incidentally, they are also capable of designing schemes to destroy the planet. Intelligence may well be an evolutionary dead end, but it's no surprise it might take a while to figure that one out. You need to develop that level of technology that can be a real threat to survival. As it is, people have routinely destroyed the environments they've inhabited throughout the planet.

Our only hope is in our capacity to learn. Whether our society has the political will to apply those lessons, i.e. be a fit society for survival, remains to be seen. I can't say I'm optimistic.

Actually, they recognize good and evil quite well, and often react. Many people keep dogs or cats for companionship. Both dogs and cats respond to kindness, which is what makes them such excellent companions. Kindness is a good thing, I think. They will also recognize evil and respond to it. This is no doubt true of a great number of animals.

The choice presented to the animal through the recognition of good and evil is whether or not to react. In my experience a dog will always let its companion know if someone evil enters its space. Cats sometimes choose not to react. I don’t know why.

The good or evil recognized and/or reacted to resides in humans.

Evil proceeds from a lack of interpersonal empathy.

When a person fails to fully appreciate, at a spiritual/emotional level, the effects of his behaivior upon others, where the others are fully understood to be of equal reality and validity; The natural desire to forward one's interests becomes perverted into evil deed by the lack of balancing reason.

Without empathy; I double my chances to breed by killing the competing male. With empathy; I not only recognize the enhanced survivability of my offspring provided by a larger tribe, I also recognize the unique value and right to exist of each member.

In spiritual isolation I am a fiend; In the union with my fellows I am a moral being. I think that this may actualy be quantifiable in sufficiantly large sample populations.

Our earliest paleolithic ancestor's often picked up rocks and sticks and then sharpened them with other objects for the sole purpose of hunting and self defense. Sticks became spears, rocks become sling shots. Early metal work yielded bronze implements for hunting and defense. In the spiral of technological development and one-upmanship, the fission and later fusion bomb could very well be inevitable. Since we only have one technologically advanced civilization upon which to examine the development of weaponry (us). It is not enough to say one way or another if evolution of intelligence coupled with aggression would inevtibaly lead to the development of thermonuclear devices. A sample size of one (us) doesn't give us enough to go on. I can only make an educated guess and say that it is likely that most civilizations with the ability of harvesting the "power of the atom" would have at one point or another considered thermonuclear power for weapon's applications. Then again, I could be entirely incorrect.

The oral tradition (story telling) may in fact serve a vital function in our evolution. the first oral traditions were not attempts at passing information directly or even as a means of remembering exactly how an occurrence unfolded, but rather they were vehicles upon which the symbolism relating to an event could be passed through time and distance. People are not that good at remembering details or tend to add a few of their own. Go to a crowded room, ask one person to relay a message to someone standing at the other side. The message is unlikely to remain unaltered. (i.e. initial message: I am leaving at 10 p.m., message the person standing at the other end of the

Dear All,

I need to take a break due to a family concern.

I look forward to returning and enjoying these conversations.

Cheers

(continued)

room after being related by at least a dozen people: E.C. is leaving at 10. p.m. purple monkey dishwasher). You get my point. Forms of communication (legends,myths,hymns,prayer, etc) which evoke symbols rather than relating direct information serve as a much more reliable vehicle of communication although even these methods are nowhere near foolproof either. That is why certain care must be taken in interpreting certain scriptural passages. Much of the Bible was passed on orally before the first manuscripts were written.(The gospels were not put down in written form until ~70 AD - around 40 years after the crucifixion of Jesus Christ)

My parent's terrier will not only let them know if someone "evil" is approaching but will let them know if anyone period is approaching regardless if they are my parents themselves, members of the family, mail man,etc.. But then again, if there was such a things as high school for dogs, this terrier probably would not be in the advanced placement classes.

At the risk of offending cat lovers, each and every cat you own is waiting for the day you have your back turned so that they can stalk you and pounce just as their cousins do to zebras on the Serengeti plains of Africa.

Oh, well, so I'm offended <g> take 20 lashes with a wet noodle. I own three of these creatures. None of them are waiting to stalk me, but what is more interesting, and I didn't really realise this until I owned three at the same time, is that they have unique personalities. I could give loads of examples, but I don't want to turn it into pet tricks board... but one just hopped up on my computer desk, pawed out a pecan from a basket I keep up there, and proceeded to chase it around the room. She doesn't like other nuts. The other cats don't do this. In fact, they all have distinct personalities... this one likes feet and trying to trip you up on the stairs, that one doesn't like to be held, the third likes to butt heads.

My point is that I think we've under-estimated the capacity of animals for sophisticated responses to their environment, and for self-awareness. In our drive to avoid anthropomorphism, we've actually missed the application of Occam's razor. In other words, it's simpler to assume that animals feel similar emotions to us, when they act in similar ways. It's not actually a simplification to assume they are non-aware automatons at all. That's the stretch, but I think we made that stretch because we wanted to distance ourselves from the animals. That was a mistake.

Points well taken. By the way, you have probably suffered the profuse scratching that occurs when you attempt to give each of your cats a proper bath. May I recommend the cat tub - a new device which immobilizes the cat in a basket with its head protruding which is submerged in a prefilled bath tub. Of cause the cat is unharmed in the procedure and so are your. The only thing the cat has to do is get clean and hate you. For details look at

B Joy,

on evil….

The second sentence is not a conclusion of the first. They are unrelated. Plus, I don’t really think that the first sentence is all that self-evident.

Not at all! But your point seems to be, since only humans can define things as "evil" and only we do things that are "evil" that "evil" must be exclusively human. This doesn’t make sense. Good, whether or not it is the opposite of evil, fits all the qualification for being intrinsically human. Only humans call things good, therefore only humans do good acts, ergo, humans must be intrinsically good. Likewise, only humans can make plastic, only humans do make plastic, and only humans use plastic things. Ergo, the use of plastic is intrinsically human. Doesn’t work.

Amusing. Just because we name something doesn’t mean it "exists". Superwidgets Who Control Your Brain. There, I named something. Must it exist? Yes, we call something "evil". I have argued that what we call "evil" is a privation of what we have prior to that, valuated as "good". You still haven’t shown me how it is evident that evil is anything more than this. Yes, yes, it has a name. So much empty breath does not lend substance. "Evil" is shorter to say than "Privation and/or corruption of what was previously valuated as ‘Good’

Joy,

on evil continued....

"Evil" is shorter to say than "Privation and/or corruption of what was previously valuated as ‘Good’

B Joy,

on evil continued (my posts are kinda getting messed up--the last one looked right on the edit page, but posted only the one sentence. Hope this works)

See above. It is only a part of us in the same way that "plastic artisanship" is part of us. Or, "good".

This is a sidenote, really. The passage is a play on words. It’s a pun, essentially. The divine name, YHWH, is very close to the verb "to be" (hyh, yhyh in the imperfect). In fact, it is (generally recognized by scholars as) a frozen archaic form of the causitive binyan of the verb "to be". Frank Moore Cross, probably the foremost biblical (Hebrew) scholar of the last half of this century, posits that the original name of the god of the Israelites was "El who makes (i.e., who causes to be=yhwh) Armies"—the traces of which are found in the various "El" epithets of god in the Hebrew Bible, as well as the epithet "YHWH of Armies", usually translated as "the Lord of Hosts". Hence the pun with "Yahweh" and "I am."

I still can’t figure out what the absurdity is. How is it that evil 1) exists as anything other than a privation of the good or 2) is inherent in all humans. So, we humans name it. So what. See plastic artisanship—at least that is physical, tang

I think the only way to get at the meaning of difficult text--and much of the Bible is difficult--is to analyze the text in a scientific manner. Scholars typically use form criticism to arrive at the context, meaning and theology of Biblical text. One does not get to the true meaning by playing "let's pretend." The funny thing is that in your initial posts, you said your purpose, as a scientist, was to apply scientific principles to the creation story.

Which is it Russell? Scientific principles, or "let's pretend"?

Neither would I. I think our sense of right and wrong, and thus our sense of morality, is more nature than nurture. And to the extent that nurture is involved, it is "intelligence based." Thus nurture, to the extent that it can be distinguished from nature, is also essentially nature.

Yes, Bill, but the problem is that you are not really a creationist. To answer that question, we need a "real" creationist. Is there not one--not even one--on this board to tell us--from a creationist point of view--if the genetic divergence of a lion and a tiger should be considered microevolution or macoevolution?

Joy, are you suggesting that other animals do not have free will? Nonsense. We have more choices than other animals, but only because our greater intelligence allows us to identify additional choices. The only real difference between us and the other animals is our greater intelligence. Except for that, there is no substantial difference.

Joy,

on evil, continued...

So what. See plastic artisanship—at least that is physical, tangible. We can prove we make plastic. It’s a tougher case to make for evil being inherent to human nature, so near as I can tell.

This makes it plain enough. I still don’t understand why they are essentially evil rather than essentially good. This is clearly impossible if evil is indeed only a privation of the good. Evil would have to be a postive something in its own right to be a postive, everpresent human trait. Could you define evil other than just something that wells up inside all humans?

The sentient being who commits good acts is the same sentient being who defines good. Can good be outside of us? The sentient being who commist flubberly acts is the same sentient being who defines flubberly; can flubberiness be outside us? Sure as tootin’ can. In fact, it doesn’t even have to exist at all.

I would think you might have trouble proving it considing the current population of our species :-)

Keith, I agree with that. But our creationist friend do not. And look, I think Leszek said a mouthful when he said: "So I think we do have problems in figuring out which category a pair of closely related species fits into, and that's part of the problem when creationists and evolutionists talk past each other. As often as not, they are talking apples and oranges, and often don't even realize it. That's why it's important to define terms when getting into scientific debate in a religious context... we are not always agreed on definitions and meanings."

For the purposes of discussion, I think we need a common terminology. The problem is a lack of definitive terms. Rather than reject this terminology that our friends on the other side has given us, I think we should, for the purposes of dialogue, embrace it and get those terms defined. Once these terms are defined, I think we can stop talking past our friends and start talking to our friends.

Anyway, Keith, the term "evolution" is also often used to denote an origin hypothesis. How is it that a term that otherwise describes genetic diversity should also denote an origin hypothesis? I think it is as confusing as heck. Indeed one of the reasons I am able to see why an all encompassing meaning for the term "evolution" might be a problem for our creationist friends is that it is a problem for me with respect to the origin question. My personal preference would be to have three terms: microevolution, macroevolution and originevolution.

Now in case you do not know what I mean by originevolution. Well, for starters, it is something that Leszek believes in that I do not. He believes that life began on this earth in a primordial soup, as described by one of my heros, Carl Sagan. Can you imagine why the use of the term "evolution" to mean the origin hypothesis is a problem for me? Heck, if I were to accept that terminology, I would have to say that I do not believe in evolution. (Actually, I neither believe nor disbelieve in the notion since I see no evidence either way.)

I therefore believe that insisting on using the term "evolution" to mean anything and everything is not only confusing, it is misleading. My question is: what is wrong with having definable graduations of terms that everyone can understand and select from? It seems to me that all we have to do to have very nice discussion, and a lot of fun, is to find a real, live, creationist who will tell us what he/she thinks macroevolution means from a creationist point of view.

Then the fun can start.

Russell,

re: post # 681

No, I don’t think that that is the context at all. The context is loneliness, not sexual reproduction. It is just as easy and supported by the text to argue that the reason God created man in the first place is to alleviate his own loneliness.

Why not. God is pretty inept at times throughout Genesis. He must ask where Adam is hiding. He regrets creation altogether—in essence admitting a mistake (chpt 6). Want me to go on and give you verse numbers? The Bible is pretty clear about this.

What’s the point? Because, for one reason or another, the proper name of the deity, as opposed to his titles and epithets, was deemed too holy to use commonly.

Largely through the efforts of the masoretes who painstakingly counted every last word, and made annotations about the text and numbers of words and occurences of words in the margins. Before then, it was preserved largely due to the well training of scribes and the paucity of copies made. Not to mention the fact that the text didn’t remain unchanged for 3500 years. The earliest texts are from around the time of the Davidic/ Solomonic monarchy, the J & E sources. Around the time of Hezekiah, the Deuteronomist (or Dtr [school]) revised the collected J & E material, and added a large corpus of it

Russell,

re: post # 681, continued

Around the time of Hezekiah, the Deuteronomist (or Dtr [school]) revised the collected J & E material, and added a large corpus of its own. Later, P, the Priestly source, revised and edited the materials and added its own material. Likewise there are other clearly defined authorial / editorial hands at work, such as H or the Holiness school/ code.

Uh…because 1) John was enamored of neo-platonic thought and 2) he had read Genesis. That one was easy….

I have no idea what this means. Please explain.

I have no idea what "Jesus Seminar" is.

I can give you a very detailed answer about this, but I don’t think you want to hear it.

Russell,

Whoa. What’s your basis for this division. At least there is linguistic evidence for the Gen 1:1-2:4a / 2:4b & following split. And God does NOT create everything in Genesis 1. God never creates water. Water is, according to the text itself, most emphatically not a part of either the heavens or the earth. The waters exist and then the heavens divide them; then, a further division (actually, a collection) of the half of the water below the heavens creates the earth. Water is independent of heavens and earth and exists primordially along with God. He does not create water.

Not at all. "Let there be" is much more accurate than "let there appear." The verb "to be" is used in the jussive form: let be. If "appear" was meant, the text would have used the verb yod-resh-aleph (which it does use elsewhere in the creation account) in the Niphal binyan.

Nothing of the sort. Now, Russell, are you trying to take advantage of people who don’t know Hebrew? The word is the verb "to be," plain and simple, an imperfective form with jussive force. "Let be(come)."

This is a late Rabinnic tradition. Is there any evidence that this was the case in pre-rabbinic (essentially, pre-Christian) times? I know of none.

Russell,

re: #745 & #746

You need to read it again, and to bone up on your knowledge of Ancient Near Eastern cultures, and the culture of the Israelites in relation to their neighbors. Rahab is not Egypt. The story refers to the Exodus, yes; but to God’s control of the Chaotic force of water, which allowed the Israelites to pass. It is fusing the foundation story of the exodus with the creation story of God defeating Chaos. Even if you were right, then, what, tanniyn=Egypt? That makes no sense.

You’re right, those legions of Northwest Semitic philologists are probably wrong and you, with all your training in Semitic philology, are probably right in that the words are not related. Tho’ Latin "femina" and English "female" sound alike, we can’t make any conclusions regarding their semantic relationship, right? Gimme a break. You want names of scholars, I’ll dig them up. You dig up all the names of scholars who have published on how the words aren’t philologically and semantically related. It’ll be a real short list.

As for the adjective gdl: gimme a break. It means "real big", just like the English "great". And, like "great", it can have other connotations, expansions of the root meaning. None of the meanings are any more appropriate to a dinosaur (?!?!) than to a supernatural creature.

And on to the business that is really the root of our differences:

I’ve stated on this board before that I am Christian.

Russell,

re: #745 & #746

And on to the business that is really the root of our differences:

I’ve stated on this board before that I am Christian.

Again, I am a Christian. Is that the "disbelief" to which you refer?

The different between you and I is that you close your mind and your heart to the true meanings of scripture. The true meanings that its true human authors truly imparted to it. And what is most sickening is that you defend your narrow-sighted readings of the Bible by claiming it is informed by "faith". Please. What is true faith: the faith that delineates interpretations that are easy? The faith that is no faith at all. Are you so afraid of the weakness of your faith that you will not set it before a mirror and honestly report what you see? There is no faith in the absence of doubt. The faith that does not question itself is a dishonest faith; it is a false faith.

"Honesty before God is the first and the last, honestly to confess to oneself where one is, in honesty before God continually keeping the task in sight." Soren Kierkegaard, Practice in Christianity.

To only allow what will fit to your pre-conceived paradigms of what should be right, to assume before reading the Bible that it is "logical and consistent within itself" is patently dishonest to yourself, to Scripture, and to God. It is an ill-founded and patently weak faith that reads scripture thus.

Russell,

Cliff,
I think the relevant "terms" and "issues" are:

1. Theory of Evolution/Darwinism -- the entire body of theories and postulates regarding the dynamic development of eco-systems through selective preasure and genetic variability.
2. evolution -- the systematic change in form and/or function
3. abiogenisis -- life arising from non-life (by any means.)
4. auto-biogenisis -- life arising from non-life wothout interferance outside of the system (no hand of God stuff)
5. Creationism -- the beliefe that life (and the universe, for that matter) was created by God
6. Special creation -- the belief that all life was created, just as it is seen today, with no sognificant divergence through evolution
7. Young Earth Creationism -- the Genisis account is literal and factual; The Earth and all life upon it was created in six days, approximatly 6000 years ago

I still see micro/macro-evolution, as used by creationists, as a strawman, not as an actual concept of life systems. Neither TOE nor creationism describe the definition of these terms, as presented by creationism, as true, so; They should not be used in honest debate.

Whoa! So many good posts from so many view points.

Speaking as a believer in the religion of science ( not that I am a member of that religion, but just that it exists ) I would conclude that good is that which increases the totality of life and evil is that which limits the ability to live. (The wages of sin are death and all that old religion stuff. )

The closest parallels that modern science has to old religion is ecology. The equivalent of religious extremists are the "stop sign" ecologists. These are the people who think that humans while maybe not evil are dangerous to all life as we know it. Therefore we must stop them from effecting the enviroment.

The eco terriosts/extremists have no problem killing humans or destroying the property of others in order to make their point. ( I know this is the subject of another board. )

In fact from a "higher" point of view humans are just doing what any animal must do to promote their species. ( Oh well! that's what comes out when your human is born on a large gravity planet. )

Only if you define "soup" in the broadest sense. I doubt it was a "warm pond" as Darwin envisioned... I incline more to the margins of submarine volcanic vents, myself, where there is a plentiful geochemical energy flow... who knows but quasi-living processes might be occurring all the time, but are competed out by established life and can never flourish. At the time of origin, such competition would not exist.

But I agree with you that the question is wide open. All I can say is that the only alternative hypothesis presently on the table - "God did it" - offers no research program. At least the evolutionary theory of abiotic origins gives us something to look into, even if it ultimately turns out to be wrong. There is nothing wrong with fruitful errors, they are worth their weight in gold :)

I like your summation and agree with it.

It boils down to the same thing in us, if you’re going to limit morality to nature-nurture and choose to leave good and evil unexamined. If our evil is unacknowledged, the opposing concept remains hidden. We have no one to blame for our choices but ourselves.

"I'm having problems understanding Joy Busey's concept of evil."

I understand it, I just can’t seem to articulate it well enough. Can’t say I didn’t try, though! §:o)

"Awhile" is a relative term in time, and "You(I) Need" is entirely subjective. Intelligence did not dictate the development of evil technologies, evil did. Neurons are tools, that’s all. Ideally (since you are an optimist) we might examine the reality of what is wrong with ourselves that such weapons would proceed from something so beautiful and innocuous as the simple equation... the nature of who and what we are. Until and unless we do that, this timeline ends badly, I’m afraid.

How can you say that? No-one here has denied that there are good and evil effects of actions, and that these should be examined. That's just what we've been doing! We just decline to accept your theory that evil is somehow a tangible force. That isn't the same as denying the need to acknowledge a moral element in our lives, or the need to judge our actions by their consequences. I really think you're protesting too much here :)

Sorry, that just does not compute. In half your posts (as I interpret them), you speak of evil as an independent entity bent on destroying humanity. In the other half, you speak of evil as intrinsic to the state of being human. In either case, you seem to argue that evil is a tangible force, like the force of gravity, & I just can't agree with that. It's much too dark a POV, and doesn't accord with what I see of life. People aren't any more evil than they are good, they just are. BTW, where did you get the idea I was an optimist? <g> My friends would be most surprised by that characterization! *LOL*

There's nothing wrong with us that caused this... the results are implicit in the equations. What would be evil is the use of such weapons, but that would stem from the fact that we are primates, and tend to squabble just like other primates, and other animals, come to that. Not because of some metaphysical "will to evil". That's not say we should work very hard to restrain actions that cause evil, but why personify evil? What do we gain from that POV? And if you insist on personifying evil, why not good?

There you go again, with this science as religion stuff! :) I'll agree, there are some people who treat science as a religion, either approvingly or otherwise. Let's call that view scientism, which is how it's defined in my dictionary.

But that's a far cry from saying that all of science is a religion, or that all scientists look on themselves as high priests. Science is, to me anyway, just a tool to obtain knowledge about the world with a quantifiable confidence in its accuracy. Technology is a tool to apply that knowledge. Maybe there's a worship of technology, either overt or tacit, I don't know. There's certainly a dependence on it, or faith in it, but that still isn't the same as worship or religion.

Thank you for recognizing that there is a ‘totality’ of life, Carl, and for noting that ‘evil’ is ‘live’ spelled backwards. I haven’t had much luck making those points myself.

Funny how we’d all rather kill each other than admit we’re in this quest together, isn’t it? Religion would kill science, eco-terrorists would kill religion and science, and science would kill us all if that served their slightly-skewed reasoning. i.e., We ‘Need’ to create the most deadly technology possible, because we ‘Can’ create the most deadly technology possible. That’s impressive logic (not...)

It’s Not My Fault. In human experience, this would appear to be the whole of the law we actually follow. Not what we believe, not what we codify, but what we do. The serpent told Eve, "You will be like God, knowing good and evil." This wasn’t exactly a lie, we just haven’t digested the apple yet. Got stuck in a time-warp where our oft-repeated mistakes keep coming back to haunt us while we try desperately to pretend the mistakes are not our fault. We haven’t learned what it is we need to know.

God asked, "What have you done?"

Eve said, "It was the serpent’s fault." Adam said, "It was Eve’s fault." The consequence was exile. Cain, first native-born human of the Garden Line, didn’t bother to project his evil onto Abel (who’d already killed the goat)...

God asked, "What have you done?"

Cain said he didn’t care.

The owner's manuals for the tools of science (software) and technology (hardware) is mathematics.

However, even mathematics may have its shortcomings:

Matt Neujhar, I am not qualified to properly discuss anything with you. I’d only make a fool of myself, which I prefer to get paid for doing. Your exchange is very interesting and informative, so I will attempt to follow and hope the end result is useful, since dialogue is sorely neccessary.

I, on the other hand, have managed to frighten the religious, alienate the scientific, outrage the atheists, and confuse everybody generally. Not bad for a just a couple of weeks, n’est pas?

I find that I cannot explain my point of view, though I tried. My rhetorical failing, or maybe just my own confusion. I don’t even exist ‘here,’ ‘there’ being a past tense on what should have been a linear timeline... relatively speaking, of course. I am not-so-random chance on the uncertainty priniciple’s possibility of being, a ghost in the machine. Asking questions my creator cannot or will not answer.

Nothing new in that, is there?

Maybe there's a worship of technology, either overt or tacit, I don't know. - Leszek Rzepecki

Geez, Leszek, where do you live? At Walden Pond?

What would contemporary man do without microchips, tv, radio, automobiles, etc., etc.?

There was a power outage a couple of weeks ago in my neighborhood. It lasted 6 hours. I thought I'd go nuts.

But thanks to god Bacchus, I managed the crisis.

Intelligence did not dictate the development of evil technologies, evil did. - Joy Busey

So, you're saying that those who were responsible for developing the atomic bomb were all evil mad men in the employ of the United States Government?

Don't think so.

Or, perhaps, that Franklin Roosevelt had some evil intentions when he got the message from Einstein that us Krauts were on the verge of developing the bomb, resulting in his orders to commence construction of such a dreadful gadget?

Don't think so.

Yes, yes, there are evil people and there are good people with evil intentions. But implicating that the human race is evil, per se, is a concept too far-fetched for me to accept.

hieros gamos, Bernhard.

"The absurdity of contradiction achieves meaning when we transcend the contradictions and arrive at a solution... the perception of harmony [symmetry] always represents the miraculous solution of a riddle, a 'divinatio,' a stroke of magic. Therein precisely consists the miracle of creation, the miracle of art." - Boris Vysheslawzeff

Last time I had such a power outtage, I lit the oil lamps, and sat in the garden with a decent chardonnay... I'm not Walden Pond material, but I'll tell ya, if TV dropped off the face of the earth, I'd do a little jig of celebration. If the internet folded, I'd probably go into withdrawal, but I'd adjust <g>

There's a difference between being dependent, even excessively dependent, on technology, and worshipping it. I mean, I'm dependent on eating, but I don't worship food, though some do. So some people worship science and technology, but I don't, I enjoy them. They're essential tools for my way of life, but I wouldn't be excessively perturbed at having to live a low-tech life, either - after all, we've only been this high tech for a few years. There is an appeal to Walden Pond and its essential simplicity...

Somewhere way too close to ground zero at Trinity, Robert Oppenheimer and other gathered notables sat in a concrete bunker awaiting their opportunity to view the product of their ‘quanitifiable’ knowledge.

Being generally regular, fun-loving guys, they established a betting pool concerning the results of their experiment. One believed the earth would be shocked into splitting apart. Another wagered that the atmosphere would catch fire and burn completely away. Some thought the shock wave itself would kill every human on earth...

God asked, "What have you done?"

Cain answered, "Am I my brother’s keeper?"

This idea would eventually catch on

Thanks, E.C. That link looked a little more like napalm, tho... Opie was talking Big Boom! §:o)

The good ol' US of N came up with lots of goodies, too. My personal favorite was the EM field "invisible ship." Bit of a time-bender, but HAARP was a lot more ambitious.

Wonder what I could come up with in the way of ultimately destructive technology if I got a big enough grant????

Interesting you should bring up Oppenheimer, who spent the later part of his life trying to retard the H-bomb program and the development of atomic power... now there was a nuclear physicist who knew the danger of scientific hubris, and was haunted by what he had wrought. He had no illusions that playing god was something for people to try and do.

Yes, those guys were betting on the outcome of the first atomic test - a way to relieve the tension of the moment. Afterwards, Oppenheimer wrote,"A few people laughed, a few people cried, most were silent... there floated through my mind a line from the Bhagavad-Gita... 'I am become death, the shatterer of worlds'." I read this as the acknowledgment of a scientist pained by what he was doing, and very fearful for the future. It was not the happy hubris of someone who has delusions of godhood. And I think that describes most scientists, who recognize that they have to take some responsibility for their work. The rest of the responsibility has to be shared by the rest of us.

The comment of god about it all wasn't recorded.

A genetically engineered, airborne pathogen of extreme lethality. Nearly everybody dies.

A large FAE device can generate 2/3rds the yield of a small fission bomb. It also has some interesting effects. When detonated near enemy troops, it does not kill by burning but the ignition of the atmosphere creates a vacuum strong enough for concussive pressure effects. Internal organs rupture and eyes are removed from their sockets before the burning of flesh begins.

This just brings up a question. What happens if humankind vanquishes itself by it's own hand or catastrophic, natural events (i.e. an extinction level event (a meteorite the size of Mount Everest))? In the book of Revelation, the Rapture is supposed to occur before the 7 years of Tribulation. What if no one is around for these scriptural events to occur?

How nice for him that his prediction didn't come true, isn't it? Luckily for Oppenheimer and the gang, God's comment was indeed evident. He Was Silent. May we ever be so lucky (or blessed) as to have the opportunity to rue our evil before we die.

To play on that playground, conscience is the very last qualification one would need, and scruples would automatically X a candidate from the running. Thus science cannot afford the luxury of being anybody’s keeper.

Are you really saying that if god speaks, it's a message, if god doesn't speak, that's also a message. Gosh, that covers all your bases! :)

That's fine and dandy put what does it have to do with the scenario that humankind is destroyed not by the events of Revelation but by some other means never mentioned in the scripture? But then again, I guess no one will be around to gloat afterwards. I always get into discussions with my father in law who states that a comet will never impact the Earth, a nuclear holocaust will never occur, or some other calamity will never befall man unless it is presented in the book of Revelation. I told him to look at the Moon's craters and he said why, they were only created by God. Christian Fundamentalism is almost as wacky the Taliban inspired nonsense occurring in Afghanistan.

Ebola, anyone? Thank God it's not airborne. I think Anthrax or Smallpox would fit. Horrible thought.

E.C. #749: True believers don't kill others or bomb clinics. God said Vengence is His. not ours.

Pharaoh had ordered all first-born Hebrew males to be killed, which is how Moses was put in the water in a basket to hide him, by his mother. The Pharaoh refused to allow the Hebrews to leave, and told Moses, that he would kill Moses if he saw his face again. This judgement of God on the Egyptian people, for having a leader, who rebelled against God, and who was tormenting the Hebrew people as slaves. It's not like God didn't give the Pharaoh plenty of chances to change his mind.

A case in point of a whole country being destroyed by an evil leader.

The Church has always viewed the sciences are describing what God has given us. As opposed to the fundamentalist mindset that views the Bible as the only source of facts. bill unverferth # 763.

I agree that true factual science describes, what God already knows, because he created all things. As a fundamentalist... to clarify your last part of the statement... All facts which are Truth will align with the Bible. Not with me or you or any one person, as we only have part of the truth at this time. But all truth comes from the Bible and we do not understand it all fully. We can only keep learning.

Cliff Beall # 793 ... Is there not one--not even one--on this board to tell us--from a creationist point of view--if the genetic divergence of a lion and a tiger should be considered microevolution or macoevolution?

LIONS and TIGERS, and BEARS, OH MY! Sorry, couldn't resist.:)-

Cliff, I would have to call it macroevolution, I consider a lion a very separate kind from a tiger. They are both from the same family, yes, but not near the same species, I don't think. There is too much difference,and I can't see any evolutionary reason, why a lion would develop a mane, it has no useful function, that I'm aware of . In reference to you question about the dating with argon, the article was too technical for my understanding. Maybe you could explain the difference.

E.C. #786...At the risk of offending cat lovers, each and every cat you own is waiting for the day you have your back turned so that they can stalk you and pounce just as their cousins do to zebras on the Serengeti plains of Africa.

I love cats, and I agree, I think the only reason they don't pounce on their owners, is because we're so much bigger than they are. I also impart human-like qualities to my cats, but perhaps in reality, it's only wishful projection. They do have different personalities, and moods.

Your message was interesting, in your discussion with Joy about Revelation and your description of that weapon. In Zechariah 14:12, this same scenario is described....their flesh shall consume away while they stand on their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes...

I think it’s highly likely we will face an Armageddon of our own making if we are to face one at all, and we have come terrifyingly close already. This ‘war’ with the forces of evil in both heaven and earth is not a lot different than what I see, because I think both are inside of us. The evil dead-ends in us (not even ‘demons’ can act in the world without a human to do the acting). The good transcends the limitations of who and what we are (including evil) and goes straight to the ‘Other.’

I believe very strongly that we need to rearrange our priorities and recognize that if we are responsible for the threat we face, we’d better quit waiting for Jesus to save us and take some steps in that direction ourselves. How many weapons of mass destruction are produced daily, ‘legally’ or ‘unsanctioned?’ By whom?...

Marie,
Not everything has purpose. Somethings just are. Evolution does not plan.

Joy where does the good come from? Do you think man can control his destiny by being good? Sometimes the best people have the most difficult lives, ie sickness, tradedy, like losing loved ones, house by a fire, earthquakes, tornados.etc. I don't think pure goodness will help control all circumstances.:)